Missouri Southern State University is a public, state university located in Joplin, in the U.S. state of Missouri. Missouri Southern State University was formerly Missouri Southern State College and is also known as Missouri Southern, MSSU, or MoSo for short. Established in 1937 as Joplin Junior College, Missouri Southern became a four-year college in 1968 and became state-assisted four-year college known as Missouri Southern State College in 1977. In 2003, the Missouri General Assembly authorized the renaming of the college to Missouri Southern State University–Joplin, and in 2005 the university dropped Joplin from its name.