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About

Northwest Missouri State University is a public university in Maryville, Missouri. It has an enrollment of about 7,870 students.[3] Founded in 1905 as a teachers college, its campus is based on the design for Forest Park at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair and is the official Missouri State Arboretum.[4] The school is governed by a state-appointed Board of Regents and headed by President John Jasinski. The Northwest Bearcats compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (Division II) and Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association for men's and women's sports. In 1905, the Missouri Legislature created five districts in the state to establish normal schools, comprising a state teacher college network. Maryville won the competition for the Northwest district with an offer to donate 86 acres (34.8 ha) (on coincidentally the northwest corner of town) and $58,000 on the site of a Methodist Seminary. The other districts in the network were to be at Kirksville (Northeast – now Truman State), Cape Girardeau (Southeast), Springfield (Southwest – now Missouri State), and Warrensburg (Central – now Central Missouri). The original mission of the school, initially known as the Fifth District Normal School, was to teach elementary school teachers. Classes began on June 13, 1906, with a lab school teaching Maryville's children (that was eventually named the Horace Mann school) in kindergarten through third grade. The school was later expanded to a full-fledged high school before dropping back to its current configuration of kindergarten through sixth grade.