Mass Email List Policy
Swarthmore College maintains various email lists designed to distribute timely College-related news and information related to the operations of the College and pertinent to the recipients of the respective email lists. This policy governs the use of those mass communication channels in tandem with the College’s Acceptable Use Policy. All emails sent to College email lists must comply with College’s Acceptable Use policy as well as other applicable College policies, such as the Notice of Nondiscrimination and Political Activities and Campaigns on Campus.
This policy applies to mass email lists maintained by the College that are intended to reach one or more of the College’s primary campus constituencies: the student body or students based on their class year; faculty members; and staff members.
Violations of this policy and/or the acceptable use policy may result in a loss of one’s ability to use these lists, along with other measures.
Accessibility
All emails sent to College email lists should follow the College’s Guidelines for Accessible Emails.
Official Lists
Official lists are meant to share critical, often time-sensitive information and announcements vital to the regular operation of the College. Official lists are managed by the offices listed below.
| List Name | Primary Audience | List Manager |
|---|---|---|
| Official Reserved Students | All actively enrolled students | Registrar’s Office |
| Official Faculty-Staff | All full- and part-time instructional staff and faculty members, staff members, seasonal employees, and emeriti | ITS/Communications Office |
| Official Faculty | All full- and part-time faculty members and instructional staff, emeriti, and others based on their roles and responsibilities at the College (e.g., Academic Assistants) | Provost’s Office |
| Faculty Only | All voting members of the faculty | Provost’s Office |
Moderation and Approved Senders
A limited number of individuals on campus are approved to send emails to official lists in order to communicate timely information that’s critical to College operations. Those permissions are managed by the list manager(s) in coordination with the chief information technology officer, the vice president for communications and marketing, and the appropriate senior staff representatives (e.g., the Provost for the Official Faculty list). Generally speaking, the number of approved senders is limited to minimize email volume.
Messages sent to these lists by individuals who are not approved senders are placed in a moderation queue and reviewed by the list manager(s), typically within 1-2 business days. Message approval is based on the criteria listed below.
Please note that the majority of mass emails intended for faculty and staff should be sent following the guidance below under Other Email Lists.
Additional guidance for emailing students via their class lists is forthcoming.
List managers will regularly review approved senders in collaboration with ITS and the Communications Office to ensure they reflect current roles and responsibilities at the College.
Criteria for Messages to Official Lists
Messages to official lists must:
- Directly relate to the majority, if not the entire, list audience
- Pertain to official College business. Examples include but are not limited to:
- Announcements from College leadership; key policy news/updates; new or significant program, service, or benefits updates; interruptions or significant changes to College operations; new hires or retirement for leadership-level positions; information on flagship campus events (such as Commencement, Alumni Weekend, Winter Gathering, etc.)
- Be clear, concise, and free of typos, grammatical errors, and broken links
- Include a relevant subject line, and
- Adhere to accessibility guidelines
Official messages may not be used to:
- Promote events that are not flagship College events. Swat Central, faculty-staff@swarthmore.edu (often referred to as the faculty-staff digest), and the reserved-students digest email list are intended for this purpose.
- Send reminders or updates to messages already sent (save for emergencies or corrections). Follow-up or reminder messages may be sent to the digest lists described below.
- Send newsletters
- The College’s enterprise email tool, Emma, is recommended for this purpose. For more information, contact communications@swarthmore.edu.
- Post on behalf of another individual or campus group who may not have posting permissions (except in limited circumstances).
- Perform any of the actions prohibited by the criteria for Other Email Lists as stated below.
Other Email Lists
The College maintains additional email lists to enable campus community members to share a wider range of information in support of College operations with large audiences, such as students, faculty members, and/or staff members. Examples of these email lists include:
| List Name | Primary Audience | List Manager |
|---|---|---|
| Class listservs 1 | All actively enrolled students, according to their class year | Office of Student Engagement |
| Faculty-Staff (often referred to as the Faculty-Staff Digest) | All full- and part-time faculty and staff members, seasonal employees, and emeriti | ITS/Communications Office |
Criteria for Messages to Other Email Lists
Emails to these lists must meet the following criteria:
- Pertain to timely information about news and events specific to the College’s operations.
- Directly relate to the majority, if not the entire, list audience.
- For class lists, the information should be relevant to that class. For instance, information on Commencement to the senior class list.
- Be clear, concise, and free of typos, grammatical errors, and broken links
- Include a relevant subject line, and
- Adhere to accessibility guidelines and other applicable College policies as noted above.
Emails to college email listservs may not be used to:
- Share items for sale, post off-campus job positions, announce properties for rent, solicit vendor recommendations, etc. The College Classifieds are intended for this purpose.
- Promote non-College events, on or off campus.
- Promote a College event more than 3 times per event, including reminder messages.
- Engage in debate or share personal political, partisan, or ideological views.
- The College’s email networks and communication channels (email, social media, campus mail) may not be used to solicit or fundraise for political purposes.
- Emails to College listservs must comply with the College’s Political Activities and Campaigns policy and maintain nonpartisan use of the College’s email lists due to the College’s tax-exempt status.
- Engage in defamation, fraudulent misrepresentation, impersonation, forgery, copyright/trademark infringement, and harassment of individuals or groups or other violations of College policy.
- Engaging with diverse views is central to Swarthmore’s liberal arts mission. However, mass email lists are not appropriate channels for such exchanges.
- Post on behalf of someone else who may not have posting permissions (except in rare, select circumstances pre-approved by the appropriate list manager).
- Share updates related to only a subset of the list audience; such messages should be sent to a tailored recipient list.
Moderation and Approved Senders
For email lists that are moderated, a limited number of approved senders have the ability to send emails without moderation. The list manager manages those permissions in coordination with the chief information technology officer, the vice president for communications and marketing, and the appropriate senior staff representative(s) (e.g., the provost for the faculty list). Generally speaking, the number of approved senders is limited to minimize email volume on these channels.
List managers will regularly review approved senders in collaboration with ITS and the Communications Office to ensure they reflect current roles and responsibilities at the College.
Automatic Inclusion
To ensure effective communication and widespread dissemination of essential information, all students, faculty, and staff members are automatically added to the appropriate email lists (managed via Google Groups) upon the provisioning of their campus email account. See the ITS Knowledge Base for more information on managing and changing your Google Group settings.
Noncompliance
Swarthmore College community members who violate this policy and/or the acceptable use policy may lose their privilege to use these lists, and may also face disciplinary measures. The College may suspend or block a community member’s ability to send campus emails when deemed necessary to do so in the interest of the integrity, security, and/or operations of the College or to protect the institution from liability.
If students have posting permissions removed, they must appeal to the Vice President for Student Affairs or their designee to have it restored.
Please contact mailinglists@swarthmore.edu with any questions about this policy.
Approved by President’s Staff: July 2025
Last reviewed: July 2025
1Additional guidance for emailing students via their class lists is forthcoming.
