Responsible Parties: Chief Information Officer
- The Policy:
The College’s technology resources may not be used in a manner that violates the law, for private commercial activities that are not approved by the college, for personal private gain, or for political campaigning and similar activities that are inconsistent with the college’s tax-exempt status.Incidental personal use is an accepted benefit of being associated with Columbia-Greene Community College. Incidental personal use must adhere to all applicable college policies. Under no circumstances may incidental personal use involve violations of the law, interfere with the fulfillment of an employee’s college responsibilities, or adversely impact or conflict with activities supporting the mission of the college.An employee’s supervisor may require the employee to cease or limit any incidental personal use that hampers job performance or violates college policy. The College’s Information Technology department will always place a higher priority on support of college-related activities over any form of incidental personal use.
- Definitions:
- Commercial activities are defined as economic activities geared toward a mass or specialized market and ordinarily intended to result in a profit and that are not part of one’s college responsibilities. Commercial activities do not include the use of technology resources for one-time, minimal transactions, such as students using their Columbia-Greene Community College email accounts to communicate with potential buyers for used textbooks. This type of transaction is considered incidental personal use.
- Incidental personal use is the use of technology resources by members of the Columbia-Greene Community College community in support of activities that do not relate to their college employment or studies or to other activities involving and approved by the College. Examples include use of email to send personal messages to friends, family, or colleagues, including messages relating to one-time minimal sales or purchase transactions. Personal use should be limited and not adversely affect or conflict with college operations or activities and should not be used for mass emailing.
- Technology resources includes all college-owned computers, peripherals, and related equipment and software; voice communications infrastructure, peripherals, and related equipment and software; data communications infrastructure including email, peripherals, and related equipment and software; all other associated tools, instruments, and facilities; and the services that make use of any of these technology resources. The components may be individually controlled (i.e., assigned to an employee) or shared in a single-user or multi-user manner; they may be stand-alone or networked; and they may be stationary or mobile.
- Personal private gain is defined as securing profit or reward for an individual in his or her personal capacity that is not otherwise permitted by this policy.
- Political campaigning and similar activities that are inconsistent with the college’s tax-exempt status include campaign purposes that would further the interests of the candidate or candidates of any one political party.
- Sanctions
Columbia-Greene Community College will handle reports of misuse and abuse of information and technology resources in accordance with existing policies and procedures issued by appropriate authorities. Depending on the individual and circumstances involved this could include the Vice President for Administration, Provost, and/or appropriate law enforcement agencies. See policy Misuse and Abuse of Technology Resources for more detail.Failure to comply with Columbia-Greene Community College’s information technology policies may result in sanctions relating to the individual’s use of technology resources (such as suspension or termination of access, or removal of online material); the individual’s employment (up to and including immediate termination of employment in accordance with applicable college policy and/or collective bargaining agreements); the individual’s studies within the college (such as student discipline in accordance with applicable college policy); civil or criminal liability; or any combination of these.