When did the UW offer its first summer term?

In 1885, 14 intrepid students became the first Badgers to get ahead (or, possibly, catch up) by enrolling in the UW’s inaugural summer session: the Stager Summer College of Languages, a six-week language program offered by Leo Andreas Stager. The session was also one of the earliest summer school programs established by a public institution in the U.S. By 1913, the UW established a 25-acre tent colony just west of Picnic Point called Camp Gallistella to accommodate the growing number of summer session students. Before it was shut down in the 1960s, Badgers camped there for cheap, worked on their studies, and enjoyed a true Wisconsin summer (complete with lakeside activities, poison ivy, and lots of mosquitoes). Today, summer term offerings attract more than 10,000 students a year and include over 1,000 courses — many of which can be completed from home or the lake, as long as you have internet access and bug spray.