Public Address Lists

Purpose of the Policy

The use of electronic mail/messaging has become the standard form of business communication within organizations. It is often necessary to communicate to standard groups of addressees within the organization for communication or information purposes. Examples of this at Azusa Pacific University are APU Everyone, APU Faculty, etc.

The preferred method of large address communication is through existing channels, however, there are situations where a message to a large community is necessary. This “Acceptable Use of Public Address Lists” policy addresses this organizational need.

New public address lists (permanent name lists that exceed a specific area of accountability or influence), are created by request through the Office of the Chief Information Officer in order to protect the organization, and the impact to the members of these lists.

In comparison, private address lists are created by individual users to address their common communities such as departmental faculty, staff (departmental lists), or special interest groups.

Scope

The public address list policy provides guidelines for the use of electronic mail communications for all Azusa Pacific University faculty, staff, and administration.

Policy

Correspondence sent to APU’s distribution lists is considered to be a business document that is vital for all staff and faculty. The appropriate use of public address lists should be to support employees in their jobs, or for APU community business and meeting notifications.

The use of APU’s distribution lists should be consistent with the university’s email policy, and should NOT be used for personal thoughts, opportunities, chain letters, employee businesses, personal political stances, sale of personal items, or for any other personal reasons. Information should be relevant to APU affairs, issues, or events that are critical and of an urgent nature.

“APU Everyone” email is a community communication vehicle that keeps the APU community informed, in many cases on critical organizational issues. APU Everyone email may only be sent by the President’s Cabinet. Anyone who wishes to send a message to APU Everyone must have said message approved and sent by one of these offices.

Prayer requests are encouraged, but should be coordinated through the community prayer coordinator, Rachel Lopez. Send all prayer/praise messages to her, and she will consolidate them and send them out as a community prayer item at least once a day. These prayer requests should consist of one to two sentences. Updates should be provided no more than once a week, and should also be one to two sentences.

APU News email is optional. Any APU faculty and/or staff may choose to remove themselves from the APU News distribution list by going to the Cougars’ Den and clicking on the Edit “APU News” options link in the “Account Management” channel. Next, uncheck the box next to APU News and click Done to be removed from this distribution list. Addition to and removal from the list is possible at any time simply by checking or unchecking this box.

Attachments, such as video clips, images, word documents, etc., should not be attached to APU News emails without prior approval from the Office of the CIO.

APU Students email is a distribution list for all students (undergraduate, graduate, doctoral and degree completion) to keep them informed of APU wide activities and events. APU Students may only be sent by the Office of Campus Life or the President’s Cabinet.

Please remember that there are public folders for your use, including a folder for personal sales. These folders should be used for those items that would be less likely to fit into the standards set forth for the APU Everyone and APU News distribution lists.

The policy above is reflected in the “Fair Use Agreement” signed by all Internet users (faculty and staff), and in the policy on computer usage in the APU Staff Handbook (page 66). In both policies, it states that excessive personal use or inappropriate use of the computer systems may result in disciplinary action, which may lead to termination.

Appendix A: Policy Routing

  • This policy was approved by President’s Cabinet on January 21, 2003.
  • This policy was revised September 19, 2005, and approved by President’s Cabinet.

Approved by: John C. Reynolds, Vice President of Information Technology
Author: John C. Reynolds, Vice President of Information Technology

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