I Purpose:

E-Communications services are provided to the Siena College community in support of the teaching, learning, and administrative functions of the College. Users of Siena’s electronic mail (email) services are expected to act in accordance with the College’s Computer Use Policy and with professional and personal courtesy and conduct.

II Scope:

This policy applies to all people (students, faculty, staff, administrators, guests, volunteers, vendors, contractors, etc.) who have been granted a Siena email account. This policy should be interpreted in the broadest possible sense. Anyone who uses the College’s E-Communications service agrees to abide by all provisions of the Policy. E-Communications includes all technology enhanced communications services, including but not limited to email, voicemail, blogs, wikis, etc.

III Policy Statement:

A. Description

E-Communications is an official means for communications within Siena College. Therefore, the College has the right to send official communications to faculty, staff, administrators, and students via E-Communications and the right to expect those communications will be received and read in a timely fashion.

E-Communications (particularly electronic mail) is designed for direct communications between specific individuals or specified groups within the acceptable use criteria as stated below:

B. Who is Eligible for an E-Communications/Network Account

E-Communications and Siena network accounts are only granted to those persons with a direct relationship with the College (e.g., all enrolled students, full and part time faculty, full and part time staff, alumni and faculty emeriti). Other requests must be in writing, stating the specific need of the E-Communications service and how long it is needed. Such requests will require a signature by a Senior Staff member or Dean. Once the direct relationship has expired, the ECommunications/network account will be revoked or disabled in a timely manner.

C. Concerns Regarding Electronic Mass Communications

The College recognizes the potential of using an E-Communications system for electronic mass communications, e.g., dissemination of information to targeted groups of persons within the College community quickly, efficiently and with cost benefits. At the same time, the College is sensitive to complaints from recipients of electronic mass communications because the messages contained information that should have been targeted to others within the College community or information which was of a non-College business nature.

Individuals must be judicious in how they target groups of E-Communications account holders for their E-Communications messages. Individuals should be considerate and not send messages to those for whom the message would be irrelevant. The College will be sensitive and responsive to complaints from recipients of inappropriate electronic mass communications.

D. Unacceptable Uses of E-Communications

College E-Communications systems are not an appropriate channel for:

• "Junk mail";
• Commercial purposes;
• Chain-Letters

While individuals may vary on what they call "junk mail", the working definition used here is any unsolicited mail that is likely to be of little interest or use to the majority of users receiving it. What may be acceptable among a selected group of faculty, staff or students is different from what may be acceptable to the entire campus community. Users should recognize these differences and direct their mail accordingly. Certain types of E-Communications will automatically be considered "junk mail."

Forwarding junk email messages to the Siena College community is inappropriate:

An example would be the “chain email” type of request or instruction to forward the message to as many as people as possible and may purport to warn of a virus, to reward you for forwarding the mail, or to raise money for a needy individual. Those forwarding junk mail to multiple members of the college community may have their E-Communications privileges revoked. For purposes of definition, a mass mailing or forwarding will be defined as anything sent to multiple users without regard to their interest. A complaint from a user about a message to multiple recipients will be grounds for considering the message junk mail.

Harassing E-Communications Prohibited:

Individual use of E-Communications to harass another individual or group of individuals is unacceptable. Harassment may include the sending of unsolicited and unwanted messages after an individual has been told that such messages are not desired. It also includes the use of E-Communications to send any threatening, sexually suggestive, sexist, racist, ethnic, homophobic or otherwise demeaning comments to any individual or group. The use of E-Communications to harass is also a violation of sections 240.30-31 of the New York State Penal Law. This includes topics covered by the human rights policy of the College.

Events, newsletters, and flyers should be posted on the Siena Campus Calendar and the link could be shared via E-Communications. This is especially suggested for Departmental information links.

E. Acceptable Uses of E-Communications

The following are acceptable examples of E-Communications messages sent as broadcasts to campus distribution lists:

• Notices of service outages or interruptions which affect large groups of community members.
• Significant Administrative Department reminders, action requests for entire groups (e.g. students), or one-time material impact messages on behalf of the Institution. These types of E-Communications messages should have brief content sent a maximum of three (3) times to any Distribution List with a subsequent link to a web page for more detailed information. Any replies should not be sent as a ReplyAll to the entire Distribution List and instead should be targeted to a specific audience. Messages of particular interest should be targeted only to a specific audience of that topic, such as a Department or Club and not the entire campus community or general list.
• Emergency notification as deemed appropriate by the Emergency Response Team.

Actions of System Administrators of College Electronic Mail Systems

A system administrator of the College’s E-Communications system may determine within his or her discretion when it is necessary to temporarily suspend access to the system to insure the integrity and operation of the system and its availability to the College community. System administrators who suspend access to the College’s electronic mail system must report the action to the Chief Information Officer (CIO) as soon as possible, along with an explanation for taking the action.

Appeal of an Administrative Decision

Individuals who disagree with a decision of the system administrator of the College’s E-Communications system may submit an appeal of the decision to the appropriate immediate supervisor of the system administrator. If not satisfied, a student may submit an appeal to the VP of Student Affairs. Faculty may submit an appeal to the VP of Academic Affairs. Staff, Administrators, or Alumni may submit an appeal to the appropriate VP in writing within 30-days of the decision.

Noncompliance and Sanctions

Reports of incidents regarding inappropriate electronic mass communications as they pertain to this policy should be referred to the Dean of Students if the alleged sender is a student; to the academic department Chairperson if the alleged sender is a faculty member; and to the immediate supervisor if the alleged sender is a staff member or administrator.

Breach of or disregard for this and other policies and procedures concerning access and acceptable use of E-Communications communication, networking, telephony and information resources may result in the denial or removal of access privileges by system administrators, and may lead to disciplinary action under the applicable College's standards of conduct. Additionally, such disregard may be referred to other authorities for civil litigation and criminal prosecution under applicable state and federal statutes. 

Official Communications of College Business

As E-Communications is a privilege extended to the Siena community to facilitate the official communication of College business, all members of the Siena College community should use it ethically and within bounds of policy. Employees can be disciplined for unauthorized use of E-Communications up to and including suspension of privileges for a particular period of time as described above. If the abuse of E-Communications requires more serious action, suspension from the job or even termination could result.

In some cases, the College authority handling the incident report may request that the system administrator suspend an individual’s access to the College email system. For example, the Office of the Dean of Students may request that access be suspended pending the outcome of conduct hearing process, or a department head may request that access be suspended pending the outcome of an investigation or disciplinary process.

F. E-Communications Quota

All E-Communications accounts are assigned a quota of space for storage of their E-Communications. Users going over quota may have their ECommunications privileges suspended. To avoid this, users should delete messages once they've been read or listened to. All users that are approaching their quota can request help from Information Technology Services (ITS) to manage their storage space and/or attend a workshop regarding using the ECommunications system in question. Under special circumstances an individual may be granted additional space above the standard quota in order to store more E-Communications online.

Email and other parts of Google Apps for Education are a special case as accounts are assigned a quota of storage space by Google as our provider. Although the quota is quite high it is possible to exceed the quota, resulting in suspension of the ability to send or receive email.

G. Email Signature for Confidentiality

An email signature is typically an automatic insertion of name and address of the sender of the email. It is required that all employee email signatures also include a statement of Confidentiality. The statement below is the Confidentiality message for our Siena community to use in their signatures:

CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This email, including any attachments, is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure, or distribution is prohibited. If you received this email and are not the intended recipient, please inform the sender by email reply and destroy all copies of the original message.

H. Automatic Forwarding or Redirecting of E-Communications

Employees are not allowed to automatically forward or redirect messages they receive to an E-Communications address that is outside the control of the institution. An example would be by having your incoming email automatically forwarded to your personal Road Runner account. The reason for this is that ECommunications to and from college employees may contain private or confidential information which must be stored on systems owned or controlled by the college to ensure compliance with laws and regulations such as FERPA, GLBA, or HIPAA.

Exceptions can be granted by the CIO. However, it is with the understanding that employees must exercise utmost caution when sending any E-Communications from inside Siena College to an outside network. The employee will be doing so at their own risk. The College will not be responsible for the handling of ECommunications by outside vendors with whom the college does not have a contractual relationship. Also, having an E-Communication redirected does not absolve an employee from the responsibilities associated with communications sent to his or her official College E-Communications address. Any employee found to have violated this policy may be subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination of employment.

IV Governance:

This policy will be updated by the Department of ITS. It will be approved by the CIO and President’s Cabinet.

V Exceptions:

Exceptions can be granted in limited circumstances by the CIO based upon the needs of the College and upon the requestor’s written justification, which has been reviewed and approved by the College’s Risk Officer.