Communicating with the KUMC Community

Communicating with the KUMC Community

There are several options available for communicating your message to the KUMC community. The guiding principal is to facilitate communication to our students, staff, and faculty in a relevant, timely manner to those needing the information.

KUMed Central e-newsletter
KUMed Central is a weekly internal electronic newsletter that is distributed on Mondays (or Tuesdays following a holiday) that provides faculty and staff a variety of information about campus events, activities, opportunities, accolades, and other news. If you have a news or story item you would like considered for KUMed Central, submit it by Thursday for inclusion in the following Monday's issue. As a KUMC employee, you will automatically receive this enewsletter. You have the option to opt out.

The Office of Communications reserves the right to edit or omit any submission. To view the guidelines for KUMed Central, click here.

Submit a story idea or news item.

The KUMC Events Calendar is the central record for all scheduled events and activities sponsored by KUMC and the primary means to announce:

• Public events - lectures, concerts, workshops, seminars, grand rounds, etc.
• Events sponsored by KUMC departments or sanctioned organizations
• Exhibits, special sales
• Governance meetings
• General interest meetings or events sponsored by KU-Lawrence or KU-Edwards

Some campus entities maintain discrete calendars on the web. These calendars "roll up to" (that is, information posted to them is also posted to) the Campus Events Calendar.

Members of the campus community can post either to the Campus Events Calendar (directly) or to a calendar maintained by his or her school or department. All postings are reviewed prior to their appearance on the calendar. To keep the calendar an effective tool, it is important that you post your event on it. This ensures that the campus is aware of your event and allows others to schedule their event at a time that doesn't conflict with yours.

University staff and students can sign up for either daily or weekly emails with a link to the week's events by clicking on the 'Subscribe' link at the top of the calendar. Here are a few tricks to make the calendar work for you:

• In Outlook, you can view the KUMC events calendar side-by-side with your personal calendar. Go to the calendar page and select the 'Subscribe' link at the top. Select the 'Subscribe to iCalendar Feed' to have Outlook retrieve regular updates on events.
• Too much? You can also click on a specific event in the calendar and just add it to your Outlook calendar (or to your Yahoo, Google, Facebook, or Apple iCal-based calendar).
• From the Subscribe link you can also sign up to receive daily event listings via email or RSS.
• You can be reminded of events coming up via email or even text message. Just navigate to the event you're interested in and select the 'Other Event Actions.'

For more information about custom calendars, contact Internet Development.

myKUMC Announcements (https://my.kumc.edu)
The myKUMC portal provides personalized access to web-based information. Think of this tool as a "Preference Center" where you can opt in or out to receive notifications on topics that interest you, such as Continuing Education, Diversity, Employee Perks, Kirmayer Fitness Center, and Research Study Opportunities. Some key topics are defaulted to be sent to everyone on campus, but you can opt out to receive these. To check out the topics available and to set your preferences on which topics you want to know more about, log into myKUMC. Scroll down through the announcements and click on "My Subscriptions." From there, you can view the topics and opt in or out to receive announcements from the groups you choose in the manner you choose to receive them, by display or direct to your KUMC email address. You can request to create a new announcements group or administer an existing group by contacting Internet Development. Generally speaking announcements are organized by topic, like Research Study Opportunities, rather than specific, departmental areas.

Broadcast Email
Five broadcast accounts are maintained: "University Broadcast" for general announcements and business to staff, faculty, and students; "Broadcast-som", "Broadcast-son", and "Broadcast-shp" for school announcements and business; and "Broadcast-acad" for Academic Affairs and Research Administration. For further information, please contact those units.

University Broadcast messages sent to faculty and staff must be approved by the Office of Communications. To view the University Broadcast guidelines, effective January 1, 2013, click here.

"Critical Information" Email

The "Critical Information" account is used to advise the KUMC community of situations that may inconvenience them, require some action on their part, or require their increased vigilance for non-violent crime but which do not involve major disruptions (including potential disruptions) of regular activities or threats to the health and well-being of faculty, staff, or students. Select individuals in the Police Department, the Safety Office, Information Resources, Facilities Management, Human Resources, and the Office of Communications are authorized to initiate Critical Information email.

Critical Information examples include

• The Inclement Weather Policy has been invoked.
• A burst water line has required the shutdown of water service to a building
• We will be shutting off power to a building in 45 minutes to replace a failing transformer
• New, dangerous computer virus: delete all emails with the subject "whatever"
• Several thefts have taken place in a specific location in the last 24 hours
• The individual whose picture is attached is suspected of breaking into cars in a parking lot.

Critical Information messages sent to faculty and staff must be approved by the Office of Communications, with exception to time-sensitive messages. To view the Critical Information guidelines, effective January 1, 2013, click here.

Mailing Lists (listservs)
An alternative to Outlook-based personal groups, a listserv allows users to join a group by either email or a web-based form. Owners of a list can auto-subscribe users and set multiple options related to how email is sent, and group members can set options on how they receive email, including digest weekly summaries of postings. Listservs are best used with large groups of people who may not be affiliated directly with KUMC. Contact Internet Development for more information.

Classified Ads & Equipment Exchange (http://www2.kumc.edu/classifieds)
Those needing to sell, buy, or trade both personal and KUMC-related products can use this site to do so. The Classified Ads link is located on the Faculty/Staff section of the KUMC homepage and are listed in myKUMC under the Services tab. Categories include automotive, carpooling, fitness and sports, for sale, garage sales, housing needed, pets, and more.

The Equipment Exchange site, linked from the Classified Ads site, is available for offering equipment for inter-office exchange. This includes furniture, computers, and other office equipment.

SharePoint
SharePoint collaboration spaces allow for small group collaboration that includes a shared calendar, announcements, document management, issue tracking, workflow, and much more. Contact Internet Development for more information.

Comparison Grid
The below summarizes the different communication methods.

	Emailed	Available from Web	Admin from Outlook	Admin from Web Page	Consolidated in myKUMC	Personalized/ Opt-In
KUMed Central
Calendar of Events
myKUMC Announcements
Broadcast Email
Listservs
Classified Ads
SharePoint