The Account Management Policy is intended to provide guidelines supporting the administration of user accounts within the Occidental domain (i.e. oxynet or @oxy.edu) used by members of the Occidental community and its affiliates in order to access and use electronic resources that are managed, licensed or otherwise brokered by the College.
An account consists of an identity in the form of a username, a password that must be known only to the account owner, and additional associated factors used in multi-factor authentication where required. Account passwords must be unique, never used for any other purpose or account, and meet specific complexity requirements.
Information Technology Services (ITS) administers all user accounts. Questions or support issues related to accounts should be communicated to the ITS Help Desk at helpdesk@oxy.edu.
Account Maintenance and Security
In the event of an information security incident or other situation involving a suspected account compromise, ITS may require the account owner to change their password or other authentication methods. In certain circumstances ITS may suspend the account until it can be verified as secure.
Account holders are able to change their password at any time by using myaccount.microsoft.com. ITS recommends using a passphrase and requires passwords to be at least 20 characters long.
Account Closure
Unless subject to an established preservation order as outlined in the Policy on Acceptable Use, online accounts will be closed according to the procedures outlined below.
Faculty and Staff Accounts
Staff accounts are closed following the last day of active employment, as determined by the Office of Human Resources. Faculty accounts are closed six semesters after the last day of teaching unless exceptions are requested by the Dean’s Office. Accounts and their associated data are permanently deleted one year after their closure date. It is the responsibility of the account holder and/or their department to ensure that all relevant College data be transferred prior to account closure.
Requests for the continuation of accounts are considered on an individual basis and must be made in advance of their closure date.
Student Accounts
Student accounts are closed one year after graduation or last attendance and are permanently deleted one year after closing.
Alumployees
Students or Alumni who become employees will be given a new account for employee purposes. The individual must not use their previous Student / Alumni account for any employee related activities including email, calendaring, and storing of any data.
Contractor and/or Affiliate Accounts
The accounts used by contractors and affiliates are closed upon termination of the relationship with the College or the contract associated with the work needs. It is the responsibility of the department working with the Contractor to notify ITS of the contract’s end or when personnel changes occur to prevent unauthorized access.
ITS is responsible for managing employee and student access to applications, servers, and network resources. These include college owned computers, Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Banner, file shares, and many other departmental applications. Our goal is to maintain a secure environment while granting employees and students access to needed resources.
Schedule for Account Management
All Oxy accounts of terminated employees and departed students will be disabled and/or removed from our systems following the schedule indicated in the account lifecycle table below.
|
Role |
Account Created |
Account Disabled |
Account & Data Deleted |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Faculty |
Upon HR notification of hire |
6 semesters after last taught per Registrar, unless designated Emeritus by Dean’s Office |
1 year after last log in |
|
Staff |
Upon HR notification of hire |
last day employed per HR |
1 year after last log in |
|
Students |
Mid-May for Fall start students. All others on a rolling basis. |
1 year after graduating or no longer enrolled per Registrar |
1 year after last log in |
|
Shared / Generic |
Upon request |
After 90 days of inactivity |
1 year after last log in |
Access to Oxy Services
Access to Oxy services also cease when email accounts are deactivated. This includes access to Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Zoom, Canvas and any other services that you currently access using your Oxy credentials. For Faculty and Students who have left the college but whose accounts remain open for a period, access to certain applications may be revoked pursuant to license terms. If the departing individual has installed any software licensed to Oxy on their own device they must adhere to the terms of the software licensing agreement. Software vendors such as Microsoft require that the software be removed if the individual is no longer an active employee or enrolled student of the college.
Departing Student Worker Accounts
The supervisor of the student worker is responsible for notifying ITS within 24 hours when a student’s employment ends. Upon receipt of the notification, the student worker account will be locked and their permissions will be removed.
Account Disablement and Transition
Upon account disablement, emails to that address will bounce with a generic message. A custom out of office message can be put in place for 90 days. Google data belonging to former employees or students will become read only. Files shared with current users should be copied into a current user’s account before the account is deleted, at which point the files may be unrecoverable.