Help Searching Michigan State University

Michigan State University’s main Web site, www.msu.edu, offers three search / finding aids:

• Find People: search for faculty, staff, students, and others affiliated with the university.
• Browse A-Z: see an alphabetical listing of MSU Web sites, both official as well as related sites of interest (for instance, hosted by student organizations)
• Search MSU: search MSU Web space.

About Find People

The Find People function searches a database that has information about faculty, staff, and students.  The database also contains contact information for certain other people affiliated with the university, such as Guest Scholars.  The search covers people currently affiliated with MSU but may also include others such as alumni who graduated within recent years.

To search for people, click on the Find People link at www.msu.edu and enter the person’s last name, optionally followed by a comma and the person’s first name, e.g.:

        doe, john

Please specify at least two letters of the person’s last name.

If too many results are returned, you will be asked to try a more specific search.

Note that some individuals’ listings are restricted and therefore you will not be able to find them using this search function.

If you wish to search only for faculty or staff, please visit: 

https://fsra.msu.edu/

Note that the information provided by Find People is updated each business day.  It may take a few days for updates to take effect. 

If Your Personal Directory Information Needs to be Updated

If your directory information is wrong – i.e. your phone number, address, etc needs to be corrected – please follow these steps:

• Faculty/Staff/Retirees:  Contact your departmental office; they are empowered to update your entry in the Faculty-Staff-Retiree Address System.
  • If you want to update your personal information such as your home phone number or your business card name, you can log into FSRA and make the changes yourself.  See: 
    https://fsra.msu.edu/AppLogin.Asp?LoginType=manual
    
• Students:  You may change your address or other directory information by filling out this form:
  https://www.reg.msu.edu/StuForms/ChangeAddress/ChangeAddress.asp
  • Students may restrict part or all of the directory information from being published by visiting:
    http://www.reg.msu.edu/StuForms/DirRestrict/DirRestrict.asp

About Browse MSU A-Z

The MSU A-Z directory lets you browse an alphabetical list of Web sites.  The list mainly includes official MSU Web sites, and also links to other sites of general interest to the MSU community, such as those hosted by registered student organizations. 

Simply click on a letter of the alphabet to see a list of all sites registered under that letter. 

The MSU A-Z index is based on the same database that supports MSU Keywords, an index of official and popular sites at MSU.  Therefore a search from the MSU home page will also find sites that are listed in the A-Z.

About Search MSU

The search function from the www.msu.edu site helps you find both MSU starting points on the Web as well as specific Web pages within www.msu.edu .   Here is how it works:

• When you enter a search, we search the MSU Keywords and Techbase databases.  For instance, suppose you search for “Wharton Center”.
  
  • If a matching entry is found in our MSU Keywords database --  as will be true for “Wharton Center” -- we offer a list of matching Web sites known as "Best Bets".  This helps you find MSU starting points rapidly.
  • If none of the sites are what you are looking for, click on the link labeled
    
    Need more results? Use Google to search MSU for "wharton center"
    
    in order to search Google’s index of msu.edu for matching content.
    
• If you search for something that does not have a matching entry in MSU Keywords or Techbase, your search will be given to Google’s index of msu.edu. You will see results, if any, from Google’s index of msu.edu. 

Please note:

• MSU has no control over Google’s index of msu.edu.  Google is a private company that offers a free university search service, which MSU uses.
• Google states that their index of msu.edu typically will be updated every 30 days or so.  Thus new or changed pages within msu.edu may not be reflected in Google for up to 30 days.
• MSU-related content that is not hosted within msu.edu, such as emeraldashborer.info, will not be found using Google’s index of msu.edu.
• If you want to search a specific site within MSU, please visit that site and use its local search function.  Alternatively, you can usually ask a global search engine to restrict a search to a departmental domain.  For instance, if you want to use Google to search the College of Engineering’s Web site for information on polymers, you might use this search:
  
         polymers site:egr.msu.edu

If You Still Can’t Find What You’re Looking For

If you still can’t find what you’re looking for at Michigan State University, please contact the relevant MSU department.  Links to departments related to the most commonly-asked   questions appear at:
 http://msu.edu/contactus.html .

You will find what you’re looking for faster if you refer to the above chart and if you correspond with the responsible department.

If you have comments on MSU’s main Web site, or on MSU Search and the MSU A-Z, please click on the comments link at the bottom of the Contact Us page listed above.

About Pathfinders

Search.msu.edu Pathfinders help you find answers to frequently asked questions about Michigan State University. Pathfinders give you an overview of a general topic area, and also may point to various Web sites that members of the MSU community commonly seek. For instance, the Pathfinder for "events" points to the major events calendars and events sites commonly used by the MSU Community.

Because Pathfinders include a human-edited list of selected sites, they should not be considered exhaustive. You may wish to consult help.msu.edu, Google's index of MSU, or various departmental Web sites for specific information.

Pathfinders are provided by the Search.msu.edu team. If you have suggestions for a new Pathfinder or for improving an existing one, please contact us.

About "Official" Sites

Pages listed in the A-Z index with the "Official" link are considered starting points for official MSU content. Such pages might be published by an MSU college, department, or other administrative unit. Please note that these official starting points may include links to content that are not considered MSU-official; for instance, there may be links to related sites outside of MSU, or links to personal pages of faculty, staff, or students. If you have questions about any content in a site listed in the MSU A-Z directory, please contact the sponsoring webmaster. Most sites will offer links so that you can communicate with the webmaster.

About Groups

Pages listed in the A-Z index with the "Group" logo are actually lists of "Official" and "Pathfinder" pages grouped together by content. Select a "Group" from the A-Z index and a list of all of the related documents will be displayed.