Northern Michigan University is an American four year accredited institution of higher learning located in Marquette, Michigan.

Northern was founded in 1899 as a place to educate future teachers. It was originally called the Northern State Normal School. In the following years it changed names several times as the institution grew, and it finally became Northern Michigan University in 1963.

The NMU campus is located on the south shore of Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. It features nine computer labs; the Glenn T. Seaborg Center for Teaching and Learning Science and Mathematics; The Berry Events Center; two on-campus radio stations; a public TV station; and the Superior Dome, an 8,000 seat stadium and the largest wooden dome in the world. Underground and raised tunnels connect many of the buildings on campus to protect students from the harsh winter conditions.

Enrollment as of 2003 was 9,016. Northern's main recruitment base is the Upper Peninsula; approximately 60 percent of students were residents of the Upper Peninsula before attending NMU. As part of the Teaching, Learning, and Communication Intiative, each incoming student is equipped with a notebook computer as a part of tuition and fees. NMU was the first Michigan public university to implement such a program in fall 2000. Eighty percent of NMU's faculty hold doctorates or the highest degrees in their fields. The student-faculty ratio is 20:1. The average class size is 23, the average lab size is 16, and the average seminar size is 10. Ninety-three percent of entry-level courses are taught by career faculty.

NMU is home to the United States Olympic Education Center (USOEC). The school's sports teams are called the Wildcats. They compete in the NCAA's Division II Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference in all sports except hockey. The hockey program competes in Division I as a member of the Central Collegiate Hockey Association.