Division of Finance & Administration | IT Services
University Email: Manage Your Information(Text Transcript)
University-provided employee email accounts
University-provided employee email accounts are strategic assets. They require that each user act in compliance with University Rules and Standard Administrative Procedures, or SAPs.
Purpose of University-provided employee email accounts
The purpose of a University-provided employee email account is to provide a method for employees to perform university-related business and to correspond with their colleagues and customers.
Purpose of University-provided employee email accounts
Since a large portion of University business is conducted using email, it is very important that your email functions effectively and that you maintain it in a responsible manner.
Personal use of University-provided employee email accounts
While incidental use of a University-provided employee email account is allowed, it can lead to additional costs to the university if not controlled. A University-provided employee email account is not an employee’s personal email account nor is it to be used for regular communications that is not considered university business.
Why is it important to monitor the information in your email mailbox?
Why is it important to monitor the information in your email mailbox? One reason is that by effectively managing the size and content of your mailbox, you can maintainoptimum performance of email. Retaining extra email messages in a mailbox slows down the mailbox, the servers, and the overall mail system.
Why is it important to monitor the information in your email mailbox?
Another reason it is important to effectively manage the size of your email mailbox is to minimizecosts to the university. More saved emails means more email servers and more personnel, time and energy spent to keep them running.
Why is it important to monitor the information in your email mailbox?
A very important reason to monitor the information in your email mailbox is that all University employee email accounts are subject to the Texas Public Information Act. Therefore, managing the content of an email mailbox can mitigate risk to the university and the employee. Keeping email messages beyond what is required by applicable rules and laws incurs risk to the employee, unit, and university since those messages are subject to open records requests and are potential evidence in litigation processes.
Email and records retention
According to Texas A&M University SAP 29.01.03.M2.01: The content and function of an email message determines whether it is a state record.
Texas A&M University SAP29.01.03.M2.01
Only email messages that meet the criteria for being state records are subject to TAMU System and University records retention requirements. An email message is not a state record unless the message uniquely documents University business and is NOT merely a convenience copy. For example, an email message that constitutes a student’s education record under FERPA would be a state record if the email is the official version of the record (and not a copy).
Email and records retention
The same University SAP states: Most email messages are transitory information, which is defined as “records of temporary usefulness that are not part of a records series, are not filed within a recordkeeping system, and are required for a limited period of time for the completion of an action.” Transitory information can be deleted from the email system as soon as the purpose of the record has been served and does not require the approval of the University Records Officer.
Email and records retention
Again, from the SAP: Email messages constituting state records should be retained in an electronic storage system for the period of time specified by the TAMU System Records Retention Schedule.
Items to review and clean-up
Some items you might consider for review and clean-up are:
- Personal email
- Emails that are not state records
- Unread email
- Email past its record retention period
- Multiple versions of an email conversation (or threaded conversations)
- Emails that are large or have large attachments
- Prior years’ calendar entries
- Archived email that should no longer be retained
Where do I go from here?
For more information about email clean-up, visit Employee & Organizational Development’s technology resources page at
UniversityEmail_ManageYourInfoScript.docxDivision of Finance & Administration
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