Around NMU

Northern Michigan University senior Elise Crossman is one of 65 students nationwide selected to receive a highly competitive fellowship through the Congress Bundestag Youth Exchange for Young Professionals (CBYX). After graduating in early May, she will spend the 2026-2027 academic year in Germany studying, interning and living with hosts on a cultural immersion program. The accounting and international studies major from Charlotte, Mich., is the second NMU recipient in two years.

At his first university forum on April 13, NMU President Chris Olsen identified the top three priorities he plans to address: enrollment, which he emphasized is the “most immediate challenge”; enhancing community relationships; and fundraising, as NMU prepares to launch the public phase of a comprehensive fundraising campaign in early 2027.

Blake Stenberg, who will earn a bachelor's degree from Northern Michigan University in social studies secondary education, has been selected as the student speaker for NMU's commencement on Saturday, May 2. The Bark River native will deliver his speech not long after returning from a student teaching assignment in New Zealand.

Northern Michigan University Biology Professor Diana Lafferty and some of her students recently concluded efforts to capture and collar moose as part of cooperative research team that also involves members of the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community and the Michigan DNR. The team focused its winter work on the core moose population area in the western Upper Peninsula.

A collaborative mural is nearing completion in the newly-remodeled Lydia M. Olson Library at Northern Michigan University. The artwork, by graphic design and ecology student Sydney Kuipers, depicts a variety of animals native to the Upper Peninsula arranged in a geometric-like pattern. It is located front and center along the wall near the information services desk. Campus and community members have assisted in painting the mural.

Northern Michigan University will host its 30th annual Celebration of Student Scholarship from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday, April 16, in Jamrich Hall. The event highlights scholarly and creative work by undergraduate and graduate students across all disciplines. Presentations include posters, oral presentations, artistic performances and visual art displays. This follows another celebration of student scholarly activity: the inaugural Winter Research Day held earlier this semester.  

Northern Michigan University business students placed in every event they entered at the Michigan Collegiate DECA State Conference, marking a strong debut for the university's newly established DECA chapter. First-place winners Maya Van Berkum and Autumn Brutyn will advance to the International Career Development Conference in Louisville, Ky., in late April.

Northern Michigan University will host its annual Middle School Women in Construction Career Exploration event on Friday, April 10, in the Jacobetti complex. About 175 students from regional school districts are scheduled to participate.

Northern Michigan University Director of Choral Activities Erin Colwitz recently collaborated with colleague and friend Gabriela Hristova from the University of Michigan–Flint to host a panel discussion at the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) Midwestern conference. Their panel focused on one of the most pressing challenges facing higher education music programs today: how to serve a student population that arrives with wildly varying levels of preparation, while still maintaining the rigor the profession demands.

The Michigan Association of Broadcasters has announced that WNMU-FM, Public Radio 90, has received two awards for the 2025 Broadcast Excellence Awards in the categories of Music Feature or Special and Special Interest & Cultural Programming.