MSU will fully comply with applicable laws governing service and assistance animals. It is important to understand the distinction between the two types of animals. Relevant policies are found here.
Service animals are trained to perform a specific action to assist a person with a disability, such as a dog that guides a visually impaired person or detects the onset of seizures. A service animal must be a dog or, under certain circumstances, a miniature horse. With a small number of exceptions, service animals are permitted to accompany their handler in any publicly accessible area of MSU’s campuses, or in any area where the handler is permitted to be.
Questions of individuals with service animals by MSU staff should be limited to (1) whether the animal is required because of a disability; and (2) what task the animal is trained to perform. Where the status of an animal as a service animal is in question, those concerns should be relayed to OCRC to conduct an impartial review, not raised directly with the handler.
Assistance Animals, including Emotional Support Animals (ESAs) are not trained to perform disability-related tasks, but instead provide comfort or other assistance solely by their presence. Assistance animals may be permitted in an individual’s on-campus residence as a reasonable accommodation for a disability. Unlike service animals, they generally are not permitted in other university buildings.
The process for requesting an accommodation permitting an assistance animal is outlined in the policy linked above. Unlike support animals, assistance animals require advance approval. An assistance animal will not be permitted where it presents an undue financial or administrative burden, a threat to health, safety, or welfare, or requires a fundamental alteration of a university service or program.
While there is no set list of species that may be an assistance animal, absent extraordinary circumstances, the university will deny requests for any animal that is not a dog, cat, small bird, rabbit, hamster, gerbil, other rodent, fish, turtle, or other small, domesticated animal traditionally kept in the home for pleasure rather than commercial purposes. All animals, whether service or support, must be kept under control of the handler at all times and must be appropriately housebroken.