Web Procedures and Governance

Columbus State University's website is an interactive communication and publishing medium through which CSU distributes valuable information about its programs and activities and collects information from various constituencies pursuing the university's services. The web also serves as a medium for educational activities and other instructional roles. All its content should be accurate, fair, legal, up-to-date, practical, and reflective of the university's vision, mission, and policies.

The university's web presence is a combination of external-facing resources (e.g., columbusstate.edu and related sites) and internal, intranet-type resources (e.g., MyCSU). For that reason, CSU's website policies will not just govern the functionality of those resources, but the strategy behind how those resources are used in tandem, and the content that appears on each specific resource. In addition, technical limitations, government regulations (including accessibility, copyright, and trademark laws), brand standards, and industry best practices will also influence CSU's website governance policies.

The following policies have been adopted to facilitate clear, consistent, and legal electronic publishing.

Web Publishing

The UITS web team and Office of Strategic Communication + Marketing (OSCM) are co-responsible for all content on the website, including creating, updating, and deleting content, as necessary. All content, navigation, and functionality requests will be reviewed and deployed in concert with the university's overarching website policies and content strategy. As such, access to the web content management system (CMS) will be limited to members of these teams to ensure the public-facing website maintains brand, marketing, recruitment, and user experience objectives, as web accessibility requirements as defined by state and federal law.

Any content updates or requests for new web pages must be made via eQuest to the UITS web team. These requests will be completed in a timely manner while evaluating those requests against the website's broader objectives. The UITS web team will consult with OSCM colleagues when necessary to fulfill those requests.

The UITS web team and the OSCM will continue auditing website content, design, and navigation for opportunities to enhance the user experience and marketing goals. The contacts for those portions of the website will be consulted, and their input sought as part of the auditing process.

Governance

All web pages must be consistent with the University System of Georgia and Columbus State University policies and local, state, and federal laws. Pages in violation of any university policy will be disconnected from the university server. Since copyright laws and university publication policies apply to electronic publishing, publishers must have permission to use the information, graphics, music, video, or photographs on their pages if the publisher is not the author or creator. The UITS web team and OSCM reserve the right to remove all material in violation of copyright infringement laws.

Columbus State University disclaims all responsibility for servers other than Columbus State University web servers. Without written permission, non-CSU servers may not use the Columbus State University name, logo, or other symbol identified with the university, purport to speak for the university or any of its units or imply any association with or sponsorship by the university. All student organization and personal pages must contain the following statement: "The views and opinions expressed in this page are strictly those of the page author and are not necessarily endorsed by Columbus State University."

Although a reasonable and conscientious effort is made to back up critical data on university resources for disaster recovery purposes, each user is ultimately responsible for backing up data stored on personal web pages. A reasonable and conscientious effort is made to provide a secure environment, but no guarantee of absolute privacy is made. Any data may be subject to examination in the course of routine systems administration, by public records law, or through legally required disclosure.

Web Service Level Agreement (SLA)

Requests that are submitted for website updates will be prioritized based on the type of request and level of criticality. Prioritization and response times that eQuest tickets will be assigned and the approximate resolution timeframes are listed below (the assignment and resolution of tickets are during business hours). Success is defined by meeting the SLA standard for all consumers of the CSU website. The UITS Web Team and the Office of Strategic Communication + Marketing team members will review and record SLA performance weekly and address, where necessary, slippage in meeting the SLA requirements. Please note that SLAs do not include projects - this level of work is coordinated and prioritized within the project management office of UITS.

Ticket resolution time is dependent on the work involved in the request and does not include additional time required should content revisions or requests necessitate vetting outside UITS.