General Use Policy

1. Campus-wide access to computing facilities is restricted to Vance-Granville Community College faculty, staff, and active students.  In addition, access to Internet   operations is restricted to faculty, staff, active curriculum students possessing a valid student identification card, active extension or special students requiring access by nature of the course requirements or by an instructor’s written permission.  Authorized users may use College computing facilities, including transmissions over and through the College network, for research and scholarly or educational purposes, and for official college business, so long as such use does not:

·      Violate any law or College policy,

·      Involve significant use of College resources,   direct costs, or substantial interference with the performance of College duties, and work, or

·      Result in commercial gain or profit.

2.  No user shall disclose an account password or share an account with another person.  Instructors will not share their accounts with students, work-study students, or temporary help of any kind.  It is the responsibility of the user to protect the account from unauthorized use by changing the account password periodically and using passwords that are not easily guessed.

3.  Any attempt to circumvent system security, guess passwords, or in any way gain unauthorized access to local or network resources is forbidden.

4.  Transferring copyrighted materials to or from any system or via the College network without express consent of the copyright owner is prohibited and may be a violation of Federal and State Law.

5.  Use of electronic mail and other network communications facilities to harass, offend, or annoy other users of the network is forbidden.  This includes electronic “chain letters.”

Information Access and User Privacy

Electronic mail, information passing over the College network, and information stored in user accounts are considered to be private and confidential.  Although this type of information must be accessed by system personnel for the purpose of backups, network management, etc., the content of user files and network transmissions will not be viewed, monitored, or altered without the express permission of the user except in the following circumstances:

1. The College has reason to believe that an account or system has been breached and is being used by someone other than the authorized user;

2. The College has received a complaint that an account or system is being used to gain unauthorized access or to attempt to gain unauthorized access to another network site, or;

3. The College has reason to believe that an account or system is being used in violation of College policy, State Law, or Federal Law.

4. The LRC Staff has reason to believe that the Patron in the LRC is using the Internet inappropriately.

Under these circumstances, the College President and/or his designee may authorize staff to monitor the activities of a specified account or computer system, and to search electronic information stored in that account.  The authority for this search must be requested on an account-by-account basis and monitoring will be restricted to the specified account.  If this search provides evidence of violation, the account will be disabled, and action will be taken with appropriate authorities.

Use of Public Facilities

Users are expected to take proper care of the equipment in all College facilities and to abide by the rules of the staff and faculty supervising the equipment.  They are to report any malfunction as soon as possible to the Office of Information Technology for repair.   A user should not attempt to move, repair, reconfigure, modify, or attach external devices to the systems this includes changing toolbars, screen savers or desktop themes.  Users will be held responsible for any internal or external damage inflicted during use.   No food or drink is permitted in public facilities (the Learning Resources Center, laboratories, classrooms, etc.).  Display of offensive or inappropriate materials on public workstations is expressly forbidden and may result in revocation of computing privileges at the discretion of the supervising staff.  Staff will periodically monitor appropriate usage. Users are required to sign a copy of the policy statement before using computer workstations in the LRC to document that they understand and are willing to comply with this policy.

Ponzi Schemes are Against the Law

A Ponzi Scheme is a form of chain letter that requests recipients to send money to people on a list.  The US Supreme Court has determined that Ponzi Schemes are inherently fraudulent.  The US Criminal Code prohibits the use of mail or wire in any attempt to defraud.  Users should note that under the wire fraud statutes, the attempt to defraud is a violation, and all who are involved in the attempt, whether intentionally or not, may also be in violation.

Sanctions for Policy Violations

Violations of policy will be treated as academic misconduct, misdemeanor, or felony as

appropriate.  For non-criminal matters, but serious misconduct, the following procedure will be followed:

·      On the first violation, the user will be denied computing privileges for a period of one week.

·      A second violation will result in the loss of  computing privileges until the end of the semester.

·      A third violation will result in permanent loss of computing privileges.

For minor violations of policy such as non-educational electronic mail, non-educational chatting, or any form of non-educational electronic communication the following procedure will be implemented:

·        On the first violation, a warning will be issued and documented

·        On the second violation, the user will be denied computing privileges for a period of one week.

·        Any violation after the second will result in loss of computing privileges for the rest of the semester with no other warnings issued.

Criminal violation will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and will result in the immediate suspension of computing privileges.  The outcome of such violations may result in student or staff disciplinary or termination proceedings and permanent revocation of computing privileges.