Letter to campus: A warm welcome and civil rights reminder

September 9, 2026

Dear Spartans,

I’m pleased to welcome you to MSU or, for those returning, to the start of another academic year. It is such an energizing time filled with anticipation and opportunity, which was evident at the New Student Orientation and many other activities already. After three years as a member of the MSU community, I remain grateful for the level of engagement, passion and care that students, faculty, staff, administrators and alumni bring to their roles.

With the new academic year comes a renewed opportunity to reground us in the roles that we each play in shaping the environments and culture throughout MSU. This is possible in ways both big and small. The ways we welcome others, respond when concerns arise and help remove barriers all contribute to a university where every Spartan can participate fully in the MSU experience.

Here in the Office for Civil Rights and Title IX Education and Compliance, or OCR, we work with our partners across the university to ensure MSU’s programs and activities are accessible and free from discrimination, harassment — including relationship violence and sexual misconduct, or RVSM — and retaliation. We do this by advancing civil rights through a multidisciplinary approach that includes policy development and implementation, incident response and resolution, prevention and education, data collection and analysis, and efforts to strengthen culture and community.

As we begin the new academic year together, we invite every Spartan to learn more about their rights and responsibilities, become familiar with available resources and join us in building a more accessible, respectful and supportive MSU.

Your rights and responsibilities at MSU

As part of our ongoing communication to the university community, we reaffirm MSU’s Notice of Non-Discrimination, Anti-Harassment and Non-Retaliation. These protections reflect our individual and shared rights and responsibilities as Spartans.

OCR administers six university-wide civil rights policies. We encourage you to review these policies and their accompanying resources:

Anti-Discrimination Policy, or ADP
Digital Accessibility Policy
Disability and Reasonable Accommodation Policy
Mandatory Reporting for Relationship Violence, Sexual Misconduct and Stalking Policy, or Mandatory Reporting Policy
Pregnancy, Childbirth and Pregnancy-Related Conditions for Students and Employees Policy
Relationship Violence and Sexual Misconduct and Title IX Policy, or RVSMTIX Policy

At the heart of these policies is MSU’s prohibition of discrimination and harassment on the basis of a protected identity (age, color, gender, gender identity, genetic information, disability status, ethnicity, height, marital status, national origin, political persuasion, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, military or veteran status, and weight), including RVSM. The university also prohibits retaliation against individuals who report discrimination or harassment or participate in the university’s response to a report.

If you experience or become aware of conduct that may violate the university’s civil rights policies, you do not have to navigate the situation alone. Anyone who believes they have experienced or becomes aware of discrimination, harassment—including rvsm, and retaliation prohibited by MSU’s civil rights policies should file a report with our office. The university responds by offering supportive measures, providing information about available resolution processes and taking appropriate steps to prevent and address prohibited conduct. In addition to the university’s civil rights policies and OCR’s infographics and other resources, please review resources created by the Office of the General Counsel, or OGC, to understand what it means for MSU’s programs and activities to be “open to all.”

To support you in understanding your rights and responsibilities, RVSM training is required for all students and employees, Disability and Accessibility Policies training is required for all employees, and there are additional optional trainings available. To learn more about trainings, including completion requirements and available resources, visit the Prevention, Outreach and Education department website and the Digital Accessibility website.

OCR’s commitment to advancing civil rights

This academic year OCR is continuing to strengthen the policies, resources and services that support students, faculty and staff. From advancing improvements to MSU’s civil rights policies to welcoming new leadership in accessibility, our focus remains on ensuring that members of our community are safe, valued, informed and empowered.

Strengthening MSU’s civil rights policies

OCR continues to lead the Civil Rights Policy Improvement Initiative, or CRPII, to strengthen MSU’s civil rights policy framework. This two-pronged initiative proposes to combine our current ADP and RVSMTIX Policy into a single consolidated policy and update the Mandatory Reporting Policy to clarify existing expectations and responsibilities for response. Through this initiative, we are working to strengthen, clarify and provide consistency across the university’s civil rights policies while remaining responsive to the needs of our community.

OCR will continue broad engagement around CRPII with students, faculty, staff and campus partners and anticipates sharing a draft framework with the university community for review and comment this fall with more information about next steps. This work reflects MSU’s ongoing responsibility to review its practices and provide meaningful opportunities for engagement and feedback to the university community.

We encourage you to visit the CRPII web page to learn more, review proposed policy updates as they are available and follow the progress of policies currently under consideration.

Advancing accessibility at MSU

We are pleased to welcome Tyra Khan, J.D., as MSU’s new executive director of accessibility compliance and ADA and Section 504 coordinator. Tyra brings more than two decades of experience advancing civil rights and disability access across the state of Michigan. Most recently, she served as the director of the Disability Rights and Compliance Division at the Michigan Department of Civil Rights, where she also held the role as the state of Michigan’s appointed ADA coordinator. In this capacity, she provided strategic leadership and legal guidance on state and federal disability laws, including the ADA, Section 504 and digital accessibility standards such as Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, or WCAG.

Since joining the university, Tyra has been working diligently to learn more about MSU, connect with university partners and understand the accessibility needs of our community. She is eager to begin her first full academic year serving Spartans and advancing the university’s commitment to equitable access for people with disabilities.

As part of this continued work, Tyra has been working with her team to rename the branch within OCR currently referred to as the Office of the ADA Coordinator. The intent of this new name is to reflect the full breadth and evolution of the branch’s work and clarification of its role as the central hub for university-wide accessibility efforts and connection point with our many partner offices. The new name also will embody the proactive, systemic approach the team brings to technical assistance and compliance support across programmatic, digital accessibility and infrastructure accessibility. We are seeking input about the proposed name change from the broader MSU community and welcome your feedback through the Accessibility Compliance and ADA/504 Department Name Change form by Monday, Sept. 21, 2026.

We also invite you to the 2026 Disability Summit, “The Future of Disability in Higher Education,” on Friday, Oct. 2, at the MSU Union. The summit will offer opportunities to connect, learn and explore a more disability-centered future through a keynote presentation by gender studies expert and writer Sami Schalk, panel discussions, workshops and presentations.

Promoting transparency and accountability

We also encourage the university community to explore OCR’s Data Dashboard, a publicly available, accessible tool that provides aggregate information about civil rights reports, resolutions, accessibility services, prevention and education efforts, and other areas of OCR’s work. The dashboard is one of several tools we use to promote transparency, inform prevention efforts and strengthen institutional accountability. Our data from the full 2025–26 academic year will be available in the dashboard next month so check it out again soon!

How to reach us

If you have questions, concerns or are unsure where to go for help related to a protected-identity issue, we encourage you to contact OCR.

Office for Civil Rights	Investigation, Support and Resolution Department
408 W. Circle Drive Olds Hall, Suite 105 East Lansing, MI 48824 Phone: 517-355-3960 Email: OCR@msu.edu OCR website	408 W. Circle Drive Olds Hall, Suite 5 East Lansing, MI 48824 Phone: 517-353-3922 Email: ocr.isr@msu.edu Public Incident Reporting form
Prevention, Outreach and Education Department	Office of the ADA/Section 504 Coordinator
408 W. Circle Drive Olds Hall, Suite 309 East Lansing, MI 48824 Phone: 517-355-3865 Email: empower@msu.edu POE website	408 W. Circle Drive Olds Hall, Suite 4 East Lansing, MI 48824 Phone: 517-355-3960 Email: ADACoordinator@msu.edu

If you have feedback for OCR about any aspect of our work — policy, process, service, support or training, please complete the OCR feedback form.

As we start this next year together, I want to thank you for your continued partnership in advancing civil rights and building a university community where every Spartan is safe, respected, supported and empowered.

In Spartan spirit,

Laura Rugless, J.D. (she/her/hers)

Vice President and Title IX and Title VI Coordinator

Office for Civil Rights and Title IX Education and Compliance