Division of Student Affairs

Social Media Policy

The purpose of this policy is to:

• Maintain the consistency of university and student affairs branding across social media sites
• Protect the university's intellectual property
• Ensure compliance with appropriate university data protection policies
• Utilize social media in the most appropriate way to achieve a desired outcome
• Ensure a consistent navigation or search experience for visitors across sites
• Provide a mechanism for business continuity in the event of staffing changes

Departmental Commitment

A social media project must be proposed with desired outcomes. IT staff will work with the department to identify the appropriate social media services to be utilized to achieve that outcome. Additionally, a department must make the following commitments in implementation:

• Agree to maintain the resource as long as it is viable, and remove it as soon as it is not
• Commit resources to regularly monitor and/or update the site
• Keep all interactions professional to reflect the university in a positive way
• Post content following established style, grammar, and branding guidelines
• Conform to information security policies regarding the dissemination of sensitive or confidential materials
• Continue to post identical content on the Division of Student Affairs website for visitors who do not — or cannot use — the social media sites

Closest Resources

Resources will be allocated using the "closest resource" available with preference going to the following services, in order:

1. The Case Division of Student Affairs website wherever possible, even when the service available may not be entirely equivalent to a service available elsewhere
2. ITS-supported Case websites, even when the service available may not be entirely equivalent to a service available elsewhere
3. External partner sites with a contractual relationship to the university
4. Other public sites

The director of IT is responsible for approving exceptions to this rule in exceptional circumstances.

Administrative Access

Services off of the Case Division of Student Affairs website must be established by the IT Operations Group, which will retain administrative access to the resource. This access will be used to modify access in the event of staffing changes, provide support to end users, or to respond to official university or legal requests.

Legal Agreements

All user and/or service agreements for external sites must be executed through the IT Operations Group, which will retain a copy of the approvals from the university attorney.

Exposure and Advertising

Social media sites are not a replacement for a department, program, or group site on the Division of Student Affairs website. Social media can be used to enhance your traditional web presence, but not replace it. You should continue to advertise your site on studentaffairs.case.edu as your primary web presence.

Upon successful deployment of a social media presence, the official website will be given methods to advertise that presence on their official website, which will be consistent across the entire Division of Student Affairs website. This method may vary by service in response to best practices or legal requirements for that service.

If a social media site goes dormant or is otherwise not maintained by the responsible department or group, references to it will be removed from the Division of Student Affairs website.

Last Updated: October 21, 2009