November 25, 2025

She’d rather have her oars in the water. But with the future of the Rowing Club at Michigan Tech adrift, Elise Buzzell spent much of her time this regatta season aboard the coach boat. Faced with a threat to the team’s existence and committed to carrying on a proud 30-year legacy, Buzzell and her fellow team leaders did what Huskies do: They used a daunting challenge to expand the possibilities.

With 55 novice and experienced Huskies suited up this year, the MTU Rowing Club, a registered student organization founded in 1995, has the largest membership in its history. About 59% are engineering students, while 18% hail from sciences and arts, and 5% from forestry. The remaining 18% are computing students like Buzzell ’27, who majors in software engineering.

Find out how the rowing club is moving forward and what brought Buzzell to Tech in this Rowsgiving feature at Stories from Husky Nation.

Michigan Tech Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) undergraduates Emily Daley, Peter Kocour and Katelyn Spolnicki, as well as graduate student Rishin Patra, secured third place at the 2025 Bright Manufacturing Challenge. 

The eight-week national competition is sponsored by the Electronics Manufacturing and Assembly Collaborative. It’s an immersive, hands-on experience for student teams who design, fabricate and test a custom printed circuit board (PCB) to serve as the control center for a robot.

Much of the challenge took place right on the exhibit floor during the SMTA International Conference and Exhibition — a high-energy, high-traffic location, with industry professionals coming around to watch and support the students as they built their robots.

"It was absolutely incredible to witness how much effort the students put in leading up to the final challenge. They were able to build on their momentum all the way down to the very last minute of the competition,” said ECE Professor Christopher Middlebrook, who traveled with the team.

Read the full story on the Electrical and Computer Engineering Newsblog.

This is a reminder for departments to continue communicating procedures regarding weather-related absences.

During times when weather conditions deteriorate, each member of the University community must exercise personal judgment about their ability to get to or from campus safely. Interruptions in work due to weather are no different from other events that cause us to leave work early or arrive late.

If any employee’s work schedule is affected by winter weather, the first thing they should do is contact their supervisor directly and explain the situation. Hourly employees may use vacation or comp time to make up for hours missed due to bad weather. Exempt employees are expected to fulfill their regular job responsibilities.

Employees should contact Human Resources at 906-487-2280 with questions or concerns.

Financial Services and Operations (FSO) periodically publishes information to increase awareness and knowledge through our "FSO — Did You Know?" articles in Tech Today.  An archive of previously published articles are now available online for your reference.  

If there is an FSO topic that you’d like to learn more about, please email fso@mtu.edu.

A production system maintenance window is scheduled for Sunday, December 7, from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. The following production services will be unavailable during that time:

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•    Banner
•    Banner Self Service
•    Degreeworks
•    Experience
•    MyMichiganTech
•    ASPIRE
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If you have any questions or concerns, we can help. Email IT or call 906-487-1111.

Tuesday, Nov. 25
• Michigan Tech Hockey Radio Show, 10 a.m. on Mix 93 WKMJ
• Marketplace Foods Kids Day Ticket Giveaway, 4 p.m.
 
Friday, Nov. 28
• Women's Basketball at Concordia-St. Paul, 4 p.m.
• Hockey vs. St. Thomas, 7:07 p.m. at MacInnes Student Ice Arena on Mix 93 WKMJ & Midco Sports Plus
 
Saturday, Nov. 29
• Men's Basketball vs. Lakeland, 2 p.m. at SDC Gym on Mix 93 WKMJ & FloCollege
• Women's Basketball at Winona State, 3 p.m.
• Hockey vs. St. Thomas, 6:07 p.m. at MacInnes Student Ice Arena on Mix 93 WKMJ & Midco Sports Plus
• Skate with the Huskies after the hockey game

*****

Athletics News
Read more in the MTU Athletics weekly update.

Florida’s Bradenton Herald, Yahoo! Finance and 23 national outlets quoted Yu Cai (AC/CS/ICC) in a story about rising streaming costs and consumer responses to T-Mobile’s plan to begin charging for its AppleTV perk. 

Quetico Superior Wilderness News quoted Professor Emeritus Rolf Peterson (CFRES) in coverage of ongoing wolf-moose research on Isle Royale, highlighting the long-running Wolf-Moose Project and upcoming fieldwork focused on studying moose populations through bone analysis. 

My UP Now and the Keweenaw Report mentioned Michigan Tech in stories about the Elaine Bacon Literacy Program, noting that many of the program’s volunteer tutors over the years have been connected to MTU’s humanities department. 

WorldAtlas mentioned Michigan Tech in a feature listing Houghton among the “11 Safest Small Communities to Settle in the Great Lakes Region.”

The Daily Mining Gazette, My UP Now, and WZMQ 19 News highlighted GLIAC honors for Michigan Tech Athletics this week, including four Huskies named to the All-GLIAC volleyball teams and MTU Football head coach Dan Mettlach (ATH) being selected GLIAC Coach of the Year alongside 13 All-GLIAC honorees from the 2025 team.

No Tech Today on Thursday and Friday

There will be no Tech Today published on Thursday and Friday, Nov. 27 and 28, in observance of the Thanksgiving holiday.

Graduate student thesis and dissertation defenses scheduled for Dec. 1-5 will be announced tomorrow, Nov. 26, in "Defenses Next Week."

Tech Today will resume publication on Monday, Dec. 1.

Early Deadline for Monday's Tech Today
To be included in Monday's newsletter, please submit your Tech Today post(s) by noon today, Nov. 25, using our Submit a Post form.

To have your event automatically appear, please submit them to the University Events Calendar.

Reading Group on Early Christian Thought: St. Augustine of Hippo’s Confessions

Tuesday, November 25, 12–1 p.m. | Walker Arts and Humanities Center, Petersen Library (318)

Join us on Tuesdays at noon for the Fall 2025 reading group on early christian though! What? St. Augustine of Hippo’s Confessions Where? 3rd Floor of Walker, Peterson Library...