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Upon retiring after decades with the same university and rank of full professor I did not realize that I would lose my faculty email account until it was too late to save years of correspondence including correspondence concerning a paper currently being refereed for publication. Are there any recommended policies on this issue for faculty retiring from colleges and universities?

John Wayland Bales
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    As I understand it this is one of those policies that vary a lot from place to place. If you're on good (or even goodish) terms with the IT staff see them in person. They may be able to get you a dump of the most important stuff on the side even if the policy is not so forgiving. – dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten Jun 12 '16 at 16:10
  • I have also similar question on mind, let's see what type of questions comes up. – IgotiT Jun 12 '16 at 16:11
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    Having worked at schools that are less research-intensive, I can easily imagine some departments or schools where there would be little expectation for faculty to continue working on research or any other professional business after retiring. At the same time I know of at least two researchers in my area of math, both from well respected research universities, who switched to using gmail accounts around the time they retired. The safest option (although hindsight is 20/20) is to make a personal archive of your email before retiring. – Oswald Veblen Jun 12 '16 at 19:28
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    There are a couple of answers already, so I'll just mention my datapoint. In my university, every graduate and every retiring faculty is allowed to apply to keep the email account. – Martin Argerami Jun 12 '16 at 20:40
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    @MartinArgerami Ditto...here's another data point. At my university even undergraduate alumni get to keep their university email account for their lifetime if they graduate. – Fixed Point Jun 12 '16 at 21:16
  • In line with @OswaldVeblen's comment about archiving, I forward my university email to gmail (while still using my university email) so I have a 3rd party backup. This has come in handy when there were issues with the university mail server, or when moving institutions, and saves me the effort of personally archiving my emails. – Kimball Jun 13 '16 at 00:13
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    I would not recommend this as a first solution, but if other solutions fail and your institution is covered, you can FOIA your old emails. – emory Jun 13 '16 at 01:35
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    ...backups, anyone? – deviantfan Jun 13 '16 at 01:50
  • You should have downloaded your emails with POP3 or IMAP (using an open source email client like Thunderbird), but destruction of faculty archives is a common problem in this era, which is mentioned in David Lankes' books various times. You may want to talk with your university's librarians, as well. – Nemo Jun 13 '16 at 08:27
  • I'd say contact the IT department right now, the university I studied at had a not widely spoken about backup, for cases like yours. When you find out your account is no longer available, but you need access to your correspondence. My particular uni kept inactive accounts for three months after discontinuation. – Joelle Jansen Jun 16 '16 at 13:44

3 Answers3

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In my experience, most institutions do allow retired faculty to keep their email accounts.

The American Association of University Professors has issued a Statement of Principles on Academic Retirement and Insurance Plans which includes:

Each institution should help retired faculty members and administrators remain a part of the academic community, and facilitate timely retirement, by providing, where possible, such amenities as a mail address, library privileges, office space, faculty club membership, the institution’s publications, secretarial help, administration of grants, research facilities, faculty dining and parking privileges, and participation in convocations and academic processions.

Although "email account" isn't specifically mentioned on that list, it would seem to clearly be in the same spirit.

Of course, your institution has the power to make whatever policies they see fit.

As to your correspondence, I'd suggest asking whether it can be restored from a backup. They might be able to give you the data even if they won't mantain the account. Your department chair might be able to support you in this, particularly if your correspondence included other department business that may be relevant to current faculty.

Another request you could make is whether your institution could set up a forwarding address, so that when your correspondents send mail to jbales@yourschool.edu, it gets forwarded on to your own personal email account. That saves the institution the trouble of having to maintain your account and store your mail, but you still get the benefit of being reachable through that address.

Nate Eldredge
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I have a friend who retired from Swarthmore who said "emeritus means forever" in response to my assumption that his e-mail would expire. Whether or not that's technically accurate, his e-mail persists.

Policy from Columbia: http://faculty-retirement.columbia.edu/post-retirement/faq-post-retirement#email%20address%20internet

Policy from Indiana: https://kb.iu.edu/d/dddx#email

Garret C
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    I have similar experience. However, not every retired member of the faculty is awarded the "Emeritus" designation. At Ohio State it is worth going through the steps, if possible: then you get not only your email address, but something far more valuable: football tickets! – GEdgar Jun 13 '16 at 02:51
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I just retired from a private, liberal arts college. I may keep my e-mail account on the condition that I use it at least once each year, a pretty nominal requirement in my opinion.

Chris Leary
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