Description
Email is a convenient and effective way of communicating with students, faculty, staff, and other stakeholders in the educational community. However, email also poses some risks and challenges for privacy, security, and professionalism. Therefore, it is important to follow some best practices for email use at OHIO.
Acceptable Usage of Ohio University email accounts
Your Ohio University email account is provided for education-related purposes only. You should use it to communicate with your instructors, classmates, advisors, and other authorized personnel. You should not use it for personal, commercial, or non-educational purposes, such as signing up for social media, online shopping, or newsletters. Doing so may violate OHIO's policies (https://www.ohio.edu/policy/91-003), expose your account to spam and phishing, and compromise your academic reputation.
Private/Personal email
Your personal email account (Gmail, Yahoo, or personal Microsoft account) is your own private account and you have the right to use it as you wish. However, you should not use it for education-related purposes, such as submitting assignments, requesting feedback, or contacting your instructors. Doing so may create confusion, inconsistency, and may be seen as unprofessional. It may also prevent your emails from reaching the intended recipients, as some institutional email systems may filter or block external emails.
Forwarding email is highly discouraged
Do not forward emails between your Ohio University and personal accounts. Forwarding emails can lead to message loss, duplicates, and privacy breaches. This practice exposes you to security risks like hacking, malware, and identity theft. Instead, use the provided webmail (catmail.ohio.edu) or mobile app for accessing emails from different devices or locations.
Furthermore, forwarding Ohio University emails to personal accounts opens up your personal email to a public records request and may violate restrictions on sensitive data. Likewise, personal email forwarded to OHIO email is subject to public records requests.
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