The earliest trace of a summer session is in 1880, when the superintendent of Knox County Schools held an institute for county teachers on campus. Soon, this developed into a State Institute. This annual teachers’ meeting in the early nineties was called The State Institute, and it was followed by a six weeks’ County Normal School session in 1892. Until 1902 these were the only regular summer schools of the kind in the state. The Summer School of the South was established at UT in 1902, and in 1912 it was merged into the university with provisions, among others, that regular university work could be carried on in most of the departments and credited toward degrees, and that courses required for entrance to UT would be offered to enable students to present the full complement of 14 units required for admission.
In the first (1912) session in which the summer school was operated as a part of the university, total enrollment was more than 2,400, with more than 100 working for university credit. Tuition rose to $10. As World War I approached, attendance declined. In 1916 attendance fell below 1,500, and in 1918 the summer school enrolled only 902 and posted a large deficit, causing the board of trustees to follow Ayres’s recommendation that it be terminated. A Summer Law School was held in 1903 and 1905, at the time of the regular session of the Summer School of the South, but the regular first law summer session was in 1931.