University of Missouri

The University of Missouri (Mizzou or MU) is a public land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus University of Missouri System. MU was founded in 1839 and was the first public university west of the Mississippi River. It has been a member of the Association of American Universities since 1908 and is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity". Enrolling 31,401 students in 2021, it offers more than 300 degree programs in thirteen major academic divisions. Its Missouri School of Journalism was founded by Walter Williams in 1908 as the world's first journalism school; it publishes a daily newspaper, the Columbia Missourian, and operates NBC affiliate KOMU. The University of Missouri Research Reactor Center is the United States’ sole source of isotopes used in nuclear medicine. The university operates University of Missouri Health Care, running a number of hospitals and clinics in Mid-Missouri. Its NCAA Division I athletic teams are known as the Missouri Tigers, and compete in the Southeastern Conference. The American tradition of homecoming is claimed to have originated at Missouri. University of Missouri alumni, faculty, and staff include 18 Rhodes Scholars, 19 Truman Scholars, 141 Fulbright Scholars, 7 Governors of Missouri, and 6 members of the U.S. Congress. Two alumni and faculty have been awarded the Nobel Prize: alumnus Frederick Chapman Robbins won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1954 and George Smith (chemist) was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2018 while affiliated with the university. History