May 2018

The NMU Student Leader Fellowship Program expresses its appreciation to the following faculty and staff members who served as mentors for the SLFP. For one academic year, they acted as a role model, adviser and friend for a student fellow by providing guidance and support to the students as they strive to become leaders of their communities through service.

The Northern Michigan University Athletics Department has introduced the NMU Sports Hall of Fame Induction Class of 2018. Inductees this year will be Richard "Dick" Allen, Tim Jones, John LaPointe, Heather (Mizer) Sarnowski, Kim (Storm) Ylitalo and the 1997-98 women's basketball team.

Northern Michigan University is closing three campus buildings as a precautionary measure to facilitate additional water testing after inconsistent lead level readings from limited test areas in each facility. The PEIF, Thomas Fine Arts and the Learning Resources Center will remain closed until NMU receives expedited independent laboratory results—potentially over the weekend—and makes a determination of whether additional investigation and testing is required. Employees in the three impacted buildings should contact their supervisors about working arrangements for the remainder of this week. Updated information will be available at www.nmu.edu/watertest.

The Michigan Consortium of Advanced Networks (MCAN) will hold listening sessions across the state to gather feedback on the best ways to strengthen broadband access and connectivity in the state. MCAN Vice Chair Gavin Leach of Northern Michigan University will host the Upper Peninsula listening session. The event is scheduled from 2-3:30 p.m. Thursday, May 24, in 1318 Jamrich Hall at NMU.

The Northern Michigan University Board of Trustees today demonstrated its support for continued transformation led by a strategic plan that focuses on investment and innovation. Trustees approved a 2018-19 tuition and fees schedule that will generate additional investment dollars while preserving NMU’s longtime rank of second-lowest tuition and fees among Michigan’s public universities. The combined average cost for full-time resident undergraduates will be $5,280.50 per semester, an increase of $245 per semester from last year’s rate.

The Northern Michigan University Board of Trustees presented its annual Student Achievement Awards for significant contributions to the quality of life at NMU through extracurricular activities or work in a university department. Recipients were: Meghan Hohenstein of Bloomington, Minn., Outstanding Female Graduating Senior; Adam Kall of Davenport, Iowa, Outstanding Male Graduating Senior; Samantha Black of Caledonia, Mich., Outstanding Student of Any Class; and Joseph Roberts, Outstanding Nontraditional Student. Michelle Gardiner, who will be relocating from Texas to Germany with the U.S. Air Force, received the new Outstanding Global Campus Student award.

It is not common for triplets to graduate from the same college, but the Rhodes brothers of Memphis, Mich., have ramped up the rarity factor at Northern Michigan University. All three will receive bachelor’s degrees on May 5 in the same major—construction management—and all have earned a perfect 4.0 grade-point average over their academic careers. They even share the same professional goal of someday running their own construction firm. The trio is composed of Jacob and Phillip, who are identical, and Ryan, who is fraternal.

Northern Michigan University will bring back its one-credit RAD self-defense course for women in the fall. The goal of the RAD approach is to reduce victimization through informed decision-making choices and sensible action. It is a practical blend of threat-avoidance strategies and real-world assault resistance tactics.

In honor of its 40th anniversary, the Hiawatha Music Co-op has donated 40 native trees and shrubs to Northern Michigan University. They will be planted in the Outdoor Learning Areas (OLAs) off Elizabeth Harden Drive between Whitman Hall and New Science. Volunteers are invited to participate at 1 p.m. Sunday, May 13.