The University of Tennessee opened its Nashville branch in 1947. This institution offered one year of extension credit until 1960, when UT's Board of Trustees authorized it to provide two years of resident credit. The program expanded further in 1963 when an additional year of credit was permitted. It became a four-year degree-granting institution in 1971 and was recognized as a UT campus by the General Assembly. It was argued, however, that this institution further segregated higher education by competing with the historically black Tennessee State University and so functionally establishing two national comprehensive universities in Nashville, one for blacks and one for whites. As a result, UT Nashville formally merged with TSU in 1979.