COP 02-0409: Email Policy

Purpose Statement

Provide general guidelines for the acceptable use of Florida SouthWestern State College email.

Guidelines

This policy covers appropriate use of any email sent from a Florida SouthWestern State College (College) email address and applies to all employees, vendors, and individuals operating on behalf of Florida SouthWestern State College. It is the responsibility of all e-mail account holders to manage the use, message content and size of their e-mail accounts. Reading e-mail daily, removing old messages and deleting messages and attachments of unknown origin are among the most common practices that help ensure an efficient e-mail system. A secure system also requires e-mail account holders to exit the e-mail system before leaving for the day.

1. Prohibited Use
   The College email system shall not to be used for the creation or distribution of any disruptive or offensive messages, including, but not limited to, offensive comments about race, gender, personal appearance, disabilities, age, sexual orientation, pornography, religious beliefs and practice, political beliefs, or national origin. Employees who receive any emails with this content from any College employee should report the matter to their supervisor immediately. Below is a list of some unacceptable use of the e-mail system:
   • Forwarding or mass emailing of a computer virus, malware or spyware;
   • Creating an Outlook rule which automatically forwards all College Outlook email to an external email provider. Users may forward selected individual College e-mail items to another e-mail account beyond the @fsw.edu domain but in such circumstances they expressly assumes all responsibility for the email item;
   • Unauthorized attempts to access another’s e-mail account;
   • Sharing an e-mail account password;
   • Transmitting student records or records which are exempt and confidential under the Florida’s Public Records Act as an unencrypted email attachment; and;
   • Sending email when you are not aware of the message content.
2. Personal Use
   Using a reasonable amount of College resources for personal emails is acceptable, but non-work related email shall be saved in a separate folder from College related work email. Sending chain letters or joke emails from a College email account is prohibited. Mass mailings from College email account shall be approved in advance by your supervisor.
3. Monitoring
   College employees shall have no expectation of privacy in anything they store, send or receive on the College’s email system. The College may monitor messages without prior notice.
4. Enforcement
   Any employee found to have violated this policy is subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination of employment.

Procedures