Inside Iowa State

Inside Archives

Submit news

Send news for Inside to inside@iastate.edu, or call (515) 294-7065. See publication dates, deadlines.

About Inside

Inside Iowa State, a newspaper for faculty and staff, is published by the Office of University Relations.

Oct. 10, 2008

Group eyes commercial e-mail for students

by Diana Pounds

A commercial e-mail provider, such as Google or Microsoft, could be providing e-mail services to Iowa State students as early as spring 2009 if an evaluation committee and ISU officials approve a move to a new mail system.

The committee, which includes representatives from the Government of the Student Body, purchasing, university counsel and information technology services, will contact officials of Google (Gmail), Microsoft (MSN mail) and other large e-mail providers in the coming months to gather information and evaluate each organization's capabilities and features.

After completing its evaluation and gathering input from students and the GSB, the committee will give chief information officer Jim Davis an assessment of the potential for partnering with one of the e-mail providers. If ISU pursues a partnership, purchasing department and legal staff will work out a contract.

ISU officials and staff have been exploring the possibility of allowing a commercial firm to provide e-mail services to students for some time. ITS staff spent a year comparing features of various e-mail providers and studying how to integrate commercial systems with the ISU system. They subsequently concluded that technical issues associated with such a move could be resolved.

Much more than e-mail

Many universities have made the switch to commercial providers, said Jim Twetten, assistant director of ITS. The commercial systems generally are provided free of charge and are laden with features that few schools can afford to implement on their own mail services. Such features may include calendars, collaborative sharing of documents, instant messaging, word processors and spreadsheets, large e-mail boxes and storage, and easy access from many mobile devices.

GSB VP endorses a switch

GSB vice president Maggie Luttrell supports the switch to a commercial e-mail provider.

"This effort is vital for students because we are using an outdated e-mail system, when e-mail is quickly becoming the method for contact between students, faculty and staff," she said.

Luttrell added that amenities, such as online calendar systems and chat features, are increasingly useful to busy students.

No plans to change employee e-mail

There are no current plans to move ISU faculty and staff mail to a commercial provider, Twetten said. Many employees already are on a central Microsoft Exchange system that works well and provides a sophisticated calendar and scheduling system. ITS plans to expand the Exchange service for faculty and staff.

Summary

Commercial systems generally are provided free of charge and are laden with features that few schools can afford on their own mail services -- such as calendars, collaborative sharing of documents, instant messaging, word processors and spreadsheets, large e-mail boxes and storage, and easy access from many mobile devices.