Policy 07:14:00

Platt College employs email technology resources to support its academic mission. Email is designed to facilitate: enhanced teaching and learning; electronic communications between Platt College faculty, staff, students, and other constituents; and efficient business electronic communications. The use of Platt College email accounts is a privilege granted by the College to members of its community. It is not a right, and the privilege is contingent upon compliance with this policy.

Official Platt College email accounts are available for all currently enrolled students and College employees. Email accounts are created using the legal first and last name. Unless in the case of a legal name change (e.g., marriage or divorce) through the Registrar’s Office or Human Resources, no email account usernames may be changed. Accounts are created using [email protected]. Accounts are activated at the time of enrollment or employment hire. Email activation is communicated to users during student orientation and at the date of initial employment.  Initial passwords are created as the last four digits of the social security number, followed by a capital PC, a + sign and a capital U (####PC+U). At the time of initial log-in, the user must change their password. The assignment of the password (####PC+U) is for students only.  Staff and faculty are assigned a different password which must be changed on initial login.  If they forget their password, they may contact [email protected].

If a student or employee wishes to have email redirected from their official Platt College email address to another email address (e.g., @aol.com, @hotmail.com, etc), they may do so at their own risk.  The College will not be responsible for the handling of email by outside vendors. Having email redirected does not absolve a student or employee from the responsibilities associated with official communication sent to his or her Platt College email account. Furthermore, users who chose to merge or forward their email account forfeit privacy rights.

Students and employees are expected to check their email on a frequent and consistent basis at a minimum of every 24 hours in order to stay current with College-related communications.  Students and employees have the responsibility to recognize that certain communications may be time-critical.  "I didn't check my email", error in forwarding mail, or email returned to the College with "Mailbox Full" or "User Unknown" are not acceptable excuses for missing official College communications via email.

Platt College’s email services or system shall not be used for personal monetary gain or for commercial purposes that are not directly related to Platt College business. Other prohibited uses of Platt College email include, but are not limited to:

• sending copies of documents in violation of copyright laws; inclusion of the work of others into email communications in violation of copyright laws;
• capturing and “opening” of email except as required in order for authorized employees to diagnose and correct delivery problems;
• using email to harass or intimidate others or to interfere with the ability of others to conduct Platt College business;
• using email systems for any purpose restricted or prohibited by laws or regulations;
• “spoofing,” i.e., constructing an email communication so it appears to be from someone else;
• “snooping,” i.e., obtaining access to the files or email of others for the purpose of satisfying idle curiosity, with no substantial Platt College business or educational purpose;
• attempting unauthorized access to email or attempting to breach any security measures on any electronic mail system, or attempting to intercept any email transmissions without proper authorizations.
• using email in violation of any Platt College policy or procedure.

Users should exercise extreme caution in using email to communicate confidential or sensitive matters, and should not assume that email is private and confidential. 

As with other computer systems, it is expected users will “log-out” of their email accounts by clicking “log-out” at the time of user completion. Logging-out ensures a safeguard to privacy issues.

Official email addresses will be directory information. In accordance with FERPA privacy regulations, any student may request that his or her official email address be restricted in its publication by contacting the Registrar’s Office or updating their FERPA information from inside their Student Portal.

All use of email will be consistent with local, state, and federal law, including the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA). All use of email, including use for sensitive or confidential information, will be consistent with FERPA. To ensure compliance with FERPA regulations, all correspondence which concerns confidential or sensitive information should utilize official Platt College email addresses. Email correspondence from faculty, staff or students that requests confidential or sensitive information should not be answered if the email is not from a Platt College email address.

Platt College and its IT subsidiary email server contractor creates electronic mail backups daily, solely for the purpose of restoring the entire electronic mail system in the event of a disaster. Backups are retained and retrieved solely at the discretion of the College. If a student wishes to retain a copy of a message, s/he should file the message in a folder under your electronic mailbox.

A Student Who Graduates

When a student graduates from Platt College, the plattcolorado.edu email account remains active for 6 weeks after the date of graduation.  After the 6 weeks timeframe has elapsed, the account is permanently deleted.

A Student Who is Terminated

If a student is terminated from Platt College, email privileges will be terminated immediately. Applicable staff will be made aware of the email termination through the appropriate termination paperwork. At the discretion of the Vice President of Academic Affairs, the email account will not have a period of being disabled before deletion.

A Student Who Leaves Before Graduation

A student who leaves Platt College without completion of a degree will have his/her email account marked for deletion. The student is responsible for making any needed backup copies of email during the period that there is still access to the personal mailbox. When a student withdraws from Platt College, their @plattcolorado.edu email account remains active for 1 month after the date of withdraw. The account is then permanently deleted.

If an employee is dismissed from Platt College, email privileges will be terminated immediately. Applicable staff will be made aware of the email termination through the appropriate termination paperwork. At the discretion of the President, the email account will not have a period of being disabled before deletion.

Platt College expects all email users to act in an appropriate manner when using the College’s email system. Examples of inappropriate uses of email includes but is not limited to: chain mail, virus hoaxes, spamming, unsolicited email not related to College business, false identification, and messages containing obscene images or material of offensive language.

Individual users broadcasting e-mail messages, i.e., announcements being sent to all or most campus users, are not permitted. If you have an announcement regarding a matter of widespread institutional interest, please contact the Office of Student and Career Services for permission in forwarding the announcement. Please allow at least two (2) days for the approved announcement to be broadcast via e-mail.

The email quota is the amount of email (including attachments) that a user can store on the central email server. Platt College has a mail storage quota of 50 GB for each user account. The mailbox storage limits have been set to warn users when their mailbox has reached or exceeded the quota size. Once the limit has been reached, users will no longer be able to send and receive mail until the mailbox has been cleaned out and brought back below the quota limit.

Attachments

The maximum size of any email attachment is 35 MB. In our efforts to reduce the number of viruses received through email, malware filtering has been implemented. Any attachments which may contain a virus will be removed by the mail servers.

What happens when a mailbox is over quota?

Every night, the system checks mailbox size against mailbox quota and will generate a notification email when a mailbox is within 1 GB of its quota.

When a mailbox is within 1 GB of its quota, email cannot be sent from that account.

When a mailbox reaches its allocated quota of 50 GB, email cannot be sent or received. Access to the mailbox is still allowed in order to perform housekeeping, but the ability to send or receive new messages will be suspended until the mailbox is within its allocated quota.

Platt College reserves the right to monitor emails and the email system in regards to College policies and procedures.