Student Accounts | Student Employee Accounts

 

Student Accounts

Students currently enrolled at Towson University are entitled to computing accounts.

These computing accounts provide you with the following:

• e-mail and calendar (Webmail Powered by Google)
• Web page (on the Tiger UNIX server)
• free dial-up Internet access (through the Remote Access Server, or RAS)
• individual network file storage space (through a UNIX shell account, available via WebDisk)
• access to Towson Online Services (personal and academic information system)
• Computer Science and Computer Information Systems students receive access to the Triton UNIX server for programming purposes

You should receive information on activating your account once you have confirmed enrollment and paid your tuition. If you do not receive this information, please contact Student Computing Services.

• Student Computing Services

Please refer to the links to the left for more information about accounts and e-mail.

Policy

Students are expected to abide by the University Guidelines for Responsible Computing when using their TU computing account.

• University Guidelines for Responsible Computing

More About E-mail

Student e-mail and calendar services are available on the Webmail Powered by Google service at http://webmail.towson.edu.

Webmail Powered by Google can be used by students to read and send e-mail, and to view and edit their calendar. It is entirely Web-based, so it can be accessed from any location and any computer.

Your Towson University e-mail address will be the default e-mail address used by Towson faculty and staff for contacting you.

It is also possible for students to configure IMAP or POP e-mail applications, such as Microsoft Outlook Express, to access their email. For information on this and other advanced topics, please visit the OTS Training Self-Help Documents page.

 

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Student Employee Accounts

Student employees currently employed at Towson University can receive additional computing access to facilitate interaction with faculty and staff. Student employees receive all of the benefits of regular student computing accounts, plus student employee supervisors can request any of the following for student staff:

• e-mail and shared calendaring on the Microsoft Exchange service. (It's important for student employees to understand that if they receive an Exchange e-mail account, new e-mail will be delivered to two locations and it may be necessary to set up forwarding.)
• access to a limited area of a (or an entire) departmental shared network file storage space ("O" drive)
• access to edit specific group Web areas (for Web sites with a group of administrators)

Student employees should contact their supervisor if they feel they need any of the above access. Supervisors can contact the OTS Help Center to request the access.

Accessing an Exchange Mailbox

Student employees may receive an e-mail mailbox on the Microsoft Exchange service. This account is separate from the Webmail Powered by Google mailbox which every student receives. Student employees will continue to use the same username and password they use for their regular student computing account. Not all student employees will receive an Exchange mailbox.

If a student employee has been given an Exchange mailbox, he/she can access it in three ways:

• Use Microsoft Outlook when on-campus. Microsoft Outlook is the default e-mail application used on campus by student employees to manage e-mail and shared calendars. Training sessions and self-help documents for using Outlook's many features are available through OTS Training.
• Use the Outlook Web Access web site Outlook Web Access (http://outlook.towson.edu) when off-campus or on an on-campus computer without Microsoft Outlook. This provides a very easy-to-use web site, but may not have a few of the features of Microsoft Outlook that might be desired.
• Use Virtual Workspace (http://vw.towson.edu) when off-campus to get access to Microsoft Outlook.

Student employees receive the same default quota on the e-mail system as faculty and staff, so it is important to manage e-mail messages and attachments carefully. Learn about your quota by visiting the Checking and Managing Your Quota page.

Managing Two Separate Mailboxes

Those student employees who receive Exchange mailboxes will have two separate mailboxes -- a Webmail Powered by Google mailbox and an Exchange mailbox.

By default, e-mail messages will be split between the two mailboxes: Mail from other students and from non-Towson University senders will go to the student’s Webmail Powered by Google mailbox. Mail from official university addresses, faculty/staff, and other student employees will go to the student’s Exchange mailbox.

Students can choose to set up their e-mail so that all messages are kept within only one of their mailboxes:

• All mail sits in the Webmail Powered by Google mailbox: Students can configure their Webmail mailbox to download mail automatically from their Exchange mailbox on a regular basis using the Mail Fetcher settings in Webmail: http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=21289. The procedure requires some information so that Google can connect to the Exchange mailbox (such as server name and port number); that information is available at https://www.towson.edu/knowledgecenter/article.aspx?article=656. When configuring mail to be downloaded, you will probably want to set it to "Leave a copy of retrieved message on the server."
• All mail sits in the Exchange mailbox: Students can forward all mail that goes to their Webmail mailbox to their Exchange mailbox. This has the disadvantage of restricting the student’s mailbox to an Exchange quota which is much smaller than their Webmail quota. Instructions for setting up forwarding are available in the Student Employee document on the OTS Training Self-Help Documents site: http://www.towson.edu/adminfinance/ots/Training/documentation/WebmailPoweredByGoogle/WPGstudentemps.pdf.