WAUKESHA, Wis. — Would a Republican Party led by Scott Walker change millennials' view of the GOP? While the GOP lacks support from younger voters, Walker's presidential campaign will look to apply the governor's experiences in Wisconsin across the country.

Walker's recent electoral performance in the area including Marquette University, a private college in Milwaukee, suggests he could make in-roads among students in unlikely places. In the 2014 Wisconsin gubernatorial election, Democratic challenger Mary Burke succeeded in Milwaukee, but "campus was considerably less blue than the rest of Milwaukee," Marquette's student news website reported.

John McAdams, a political science professor at Marquette who analyzed the 2014 results, told the Washington Examiner that Walker's deficit was likely smaller among Marquette students than Milwaukee at large given the returns from the wards that serve the university. But, he added, many students prefer to vote from their home or choose not to vote at all. It is difficult to conclude exactly how students voted, he noted, but the results appeared to show Walker performing better than anticipated.

McAdams taught Walker during the governor's time at Marquette, and the professor remembers him as someone who did not stand out. McAdams taught Walker in a course that did not encourage much discussion, he said, but Walker was a "normal student" who blended in among his peers. While McAdams would not discuss the presidential candidate's grades, he said the governor was not an underachiever. Now, McAdams appears to have a mostly favorable view of the governor.

"I pretty much like Walker, but two weeks ago I got emails saying, 'Should I run?'" McAdams said, referring to the Walker team's appeal to conservatives in advance of his Monday launch. "Scott, we all know you're running. You've been running for most of the past year. … That was kind of a dumb email."

McAdams, a right-leaning professor with tenure who authors the blog "Marquette Warrior," has survived an attempt to have him fired because of opinions he espouses.

Since Walker left Marquette, the school changed its nickname from Warriors to Golden Eagles to serve a more politically correct crowd, which McAdams has written "may have been the worst decision ever made in the history of the school."

"Old-style liberals are disappearing and being replaced by politically correct types," he said over coffee at Miss Katie's Diner next to a table under a hanging placard that touted Michelle Obama's visit to the spot in 2010. "I've made a lot of enemies blogging about leftists on campus, in a few cases courses that were just extremely biased and the students would tell me about the bias, then I would get independent information."

But he thinks campus consists of students who are largely to the right of the faculty on political issues. He has now made contact with the Walker family's second generation at Marquette, as Matt Walker, who emceed his father's campaign launch with his brother, is a current student. The younger Walker is an active college Republican who has faced a unique set of challenges as the son of a political figure who angers the state's left-leaning inhabitants.

"[O]ne of the most surprising themes of my experience in college has been that political bias appears less in my political courses (as a political science and economics double major), but more so in classes like English, Philosophy, and other humanities," Matt Walker wrote earlier this year. "In the beginning years of my time at Marquette, I don't think most professors knew who I was. I don't think too many professors treat me differently when they find out, but every now and then I'll have a minor issue."

As his father embarks on a race for the White House his interactions with professors will likely change. For his dad's sake, he may need to help his father reach younger voters in order to avoid headlines that have dogged the GOP, including "Millennials see the GOP as old-fashioned and prejudiced," and "The GOP's Millennial problem runs deep."

Walker will likely need a greater proportion of younger voters to turn out for him than attended his rally in Waukesha on Monday.