Southwest Baptist University (SBU) is a private Baptist university in Bolivar, Missouri. It is affiliated with the Missouri Baptist Convention, which is part of the Southern Baptist Convention. In 2019, it had a total enrollment of 3,280 students attending at one of SBU's four Missouri campuses in Bolivar, Mountain View, Salem, or Springfield. History Abner S. Ingman and James R. Maupin founded Southwest Baptist College in 1878 in Lebanon, Missouri. The Lebanon campus originally had an enrollment of 60 students and six faculty. The college lasted one year before the city decided it no longer wanted it. When news got out that the college would be moving, the communities of Aurora, Monett, and Bolivar in southwest Missouri attempted to attract the college. In 1879, the state of Missouri chartered the school and it moved to Bolivar, Missouri. The college went through many financial difficulties in the early part of the twentieth century. On June 1, 1910, at 11:00 am., the fire that would destroy the campus started. The fire broke out under suspect circumstances, leading some to believe arson was the cause. Bolivar citizen firefighters tried to put out the fire, but the water supply ran dry and at 2:00 pm the fire engulfed the whole campus. Losses were estimated at $20,000. The college was rebuilt, and reopened in 1913. Southwest Baptist University was granted an exception to Title IX in 2015, allowing the school to legally discriminate against LGBT students for religious reasons. In November 2021 its accreditor, the Higher Learning Commission, placed it on probation for being in noncompliance on criteria related to governance, academic freedom, and effective leadership. Campus history When it reopened in 1913 as a junior college, Southwest Baptist College consisted of four buildings, two of which still stand on the Stufflebaum campus. Among the buildings still standing from the original Stufflebam campus are Casebolt Apartments (formerly Casebolt Science Building) and Memorial Hall. On March 26, 1962, a fire destroyed Pike Auditorium. Students and townspeople saved eight pianos and almost all of the sports equipment from the locker rooms of the multipurpose building at that time. Pike Auditorium was the only building destroyed by the fire. The fire became a turning point in the history of Southwest Baptist. The newly elected president, Robert E. Craig, used the event to stimulate the buying of of farmland south of Bolivar. This farmland expanded into the Shoffner Campus