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Technology Services

e-Communications

Students, faculty and staff have a variety of electronic communications tools available to them:

  • Traditional email
  • System Distribution List emails (for official College business)
  • The Wire
  • HartLink

System Distribution List Messages

Hartwick College has email system distribution lists for sending to students (ZHDListStudents), faculty (ZHDListFaculty), and staff (ZHDListStaff). The College’s Technology Resources User Responsibilities and Appropriate Use Policy serves as the guideline for the use of system distribution lists.

System Distribution List Messages are campus-wide email messages which pertain to Hartwick business or emergency communications only. Permission to send to the lists is restricted to faculty, staff, and authorized departmental accounts. Faculty members may send to ZHDListFaculty, and staff members may send to ZHDListStaff.  Any other use requires sending from a departmental account, not an individual’s account. Department heads should approve campus-wide email sent from the departmental address to ensure that it complies with new and existing policies. Students who wish to send announcements or messages to system distribution lists must follow the System DLM guidelines below and must also contact the Director of Student Activities for review, approval, and sending from an authorized departmental account.

If your area needs a departmental address (after checking with your department head to see whether one already exists), please complete the account request form.

Request a Department Email Account

Messages sent to campus system distribution lists must:

  • pertain to legitimate college business (e.g., events, meetings, etc.). Personal or commercial messages (e.g, items for sale/rent, opinions, etc.) are not a legitimate use of the lists.
  • be announcements of interest to the individuals to whom it is sent
  • adhere to the guidelines of the Hartwick College Technology Resources User Responsibilities and Appropriate Use Policy
  • be used for announcements only and should not be used as discussion lists.
  • Avoid attachments if you want your message to be seen. Many users, even if they know you, avoid opening attachments due to legitimate concerns about viruses embedded in attached documents.
  • If you must use an image or attachment, keep the total size to less than 2 mb.
  • If you need to send a large document or a document with graphics to the system distribution lists, consider these alternatives:
    • Convert your document to Adobe PDF format
    • Create or modify your office or departmental webpages on Hartwick’s website using WordPress, and send a link to your webpage in your email message.

If you need assistance with creating a PDF document, please contact the Technology Resource Center at x4357. If a faculty or a staff member in your office or department needs training to create, edit and publish webpages using WordPress, please contact the Web Administrator in Information Technology.

Message subject title:

All system distribution list messages must have the subject title “System DLM – [enter what your announcement is about]”. For example, a system distribution list message about a change in traffic patterns on campus would have the following subject title: “System DLM – Planned Traffic Re-Routing”.

Replying to system distribution list messages:

To inform recipients not to reply to the entire list when their response is intended for the sender, all system distribution list messages must have the following text inserted at the beginning of the message: “If you need to reply, please reply to the sender only”.

If you want to reply to the sender of a message to a system distribution list, use the “Reply” feature, NOT the “Reply All” feature. Using “Reply All” will send your reply to everyone who received the original message, which may not be appropriate and could clog the email system.

Sending a system distribution message:

In the “To:” field, type the name of the system distribution list that you wish to use. To send to more than one distribution list, send a separate message to each.

Appropriate list names:

  • For all Students: ZHDLISTSTUDENTS@hartwick.edu
  • For all Faculty: ZHDLISTFACULTY@hartwick.edu
  • For all Staff: ZHDLISTSTAFF@hartwick.edu

If you put the list address in the “BCC” field instead of the “To” field, it will prevent recipients from replying to the list.

Send the message as you would any other email message – with the subject and text entered as outlined above. Unless extenuating circumstances require a follow-up message, only one well written message should be sent to the system distribution lists per event/announcement.

Two pieces of information will help you to identify a system distribution list message in your Inbox. When you open a system distribution list message, the “To” field will say “ZHDLIST…” and the subject field should start with “System DLM…”. If your Inbox view is configured to preview messages, you should see “ZHDLIST…” and “System DLM…”. For help in configuring your Inbox view, contact the Technology Resource Center at x4357.

Tips:

  • Spend the time to get your announcement right the first time! Focus on what your intended audience needs to know (times, dates, locations, alternate plans in case of inclement weather, etc). You probably have only one good chance to grab your audience’s attention, and a poorly written message with errors will annoy rather than motivate your audience. Subsequent messages to correct errors are an unnecessary burden on your audience and the e-mail system.
  • Timing is important. Keep in mind that not everyone checks his or her e-mail every day (or on weekends and holidays). Give readers adequate time to receive your message and to make plans.
  • If your message is intended for a smaller, defined group of recipients, do not send it to an entire distribution list. Take the time to identify and specify the exact recipients.
  • Whenever possible, put your message in straight text in the body of the email, not as an attachment. Many users will not open an attachment because it is an extra step or because of the danger of attachments infected with viruses .
  • Use the subject line to say what the message is about – probably a date and time for an event. Users should be able to know what the communication is about by simply reading the subject line.

Distribution list archives:

Faculty and staff distribution list messages are archived in Gmail as of October, 2014. Faculty who wish to view the faculty distribution list archive can contact Bryan Del Bene for the Gmail password. Staff who wish to view the staff distribution list archive can contact Walt Smith for the Gmail password.

Endorsement of system distribution lists use….

The College Cabinet has endorsed the use of these system distribution lists for disseminating legitimate College business, including distribution of agendas, meeting minutes, invitations, and announcements (emergencies, system outages, event schedule changes, and College closings). The Cabinet’s endorsement occurred because of the benefits, including improved timeliness of message delivery, opportunities for improved communication, and potential for paper savings.

Experiences at other institutions indicate that, over time, community self-policing results in appropriate use of system distribution list capabilities and a manageable number of messages being sent. Feedback from members of the community to an individual sender regarding inappropriate messages often causes the individual to think twice before sending another system distribution list message.

Please direct questions to the Technology Resource Center at x4357 or email to: technology@hartwick.edu.

The Wire

Wire@Hartwick is the source of what’s happening at the College. Members of the Hartwick community may submit a request to post an event or informational announcement to the Wire@Hartwick according to the guidelines below.

Online issue of the Wire@Hartwick

Students, faculty and staff may complete the online form to request a posting. Hartwick username and password are required for access to the online form.

Wire@Hartwick Guidelines

Wire@Hartwick is meant to transmit timely information to and from members of the Hartwick community. These submissions will appear within the Wire@Hartwick daily email. Submissions will also appear on the Wire@Hartwick webpage on the Hartwick website.

Examples of the type of messages that may be submitted to Wire@Hartwick are:

  1. Event: Internship Fair, Art Opening, Theatre Dept.
  2. Announcement: Faculty member honored by local arts council
  3. Information: Fire Inspections, Planned facilities upgrades, etc.

Who May Post a Message to Wire@Hartwick

  • To be eligible to submit a message to Wire@Hartwick, you must be a member of the Hartwick community and have a hartwick.edu email address. Submissions are appropriate only from representatives of administrative or academic departments/offices, programs and centers and recognized student organizations. When submitting a message, the name of the student organization, department/office must be included.
  • Promotion of non- Hartwick events is not approved for Wire@Hartwick.
  • Entries which are intended for particular groups, specific offices, or departments; lost and found messages; or messages about the sale of goods and services should not be submitted.

Modes of Delivery of Messages Submitted

  1. Daily Email Delivery– Emails (one for each audience: students, faculty, staff, retired faculty, retired staff, and Aramark employees) are sent at 8 a.m., Monday-Friday. Each audience which is specified on the submission form will receive one daily message. The daily messages are not sent to students when the College is not in session.
  2. Webpage Delivery– Messages will be posted on the Wire@Hartwick webpage. The posting dates which are specified on the message submission form determine the dates that a message is included.

Attention: May 22, 2020— The Wire is not being sent to students during summer break.

Message Submission Form

Go to the online message submission form: www.hartwick.edu/wiresubmission

  1. Follow the instructions to complete the online message submission form.
  2. Enter the submitter’s name, email address, and phone number.
  3. Student submissions must include the name of the student organization which the submitter is representing.
  4. Specify whether you are posting an event or an announcement. Announcements do not include a date and time.
  5. Do not capitalize the entire title of your submission–use upper and lower case. The title should be as specific as possible.
  6. The title and description are limited to 255 characters in length.
  7. If your event has a webpage, you are encouraged to include its URL in the description.
  8. Select the target audience(s) which your message is intended to reach by daily e-mail. Messages which are intended for a student audience should specify only the student audience.
  9. Select the date range that you want your message to appear.
  10. The submitter is responsible for the spelling, punctuation and completeness of each submission. Once a message has been submitted, you will not be able to edit the content. If you have made an error or have questions about the submission process, email Wire@hartwick.edu.

HartLink

HartLink is Hartwick’s virtual bulletin board, social media platform, and student organization management tool all rolled into one.

Learn more about HartLink.