Student Email
All students at Canisius have an email account accessed by clicking Gmail in the My Applications menu, on the lefthand side of the MyCanisius portal. Your email address is your Canisius username, followed by @canisius.edu. (Your can also receive email through username@my.canisius.edu; this is the same email account.)
At Canisius, student email accounts are called "Gmail" since that's the technology running the service. In addition to MyCanisius, you will also find a Gmail button on the D2L My Home screen. And you can reach your Canisius Gmail directly (and bookmark it) by typing gmail.canisius.edu into your browser's address bar.
These accounts differ from a private Gmail account you may have (ending in @gmail.com). They have some additional privacy protections, since our Google license is an education enterprise edition.
Canisius student email is powered by Google's gmail technology. When you are looking at your Canisius gmail, you'll see a Canisius logo in the upper right.
Emailing like a Professional
Email is used across business, government, healthcare and education. The following tips are essential for students at Canisius, but are also standards in the working world. Even if professors, staff or fellow students do not insist on these practices, they are good to follow in any professional setting.
Use your Canisius College email account for all college-related communications including classes, extracurricular activities, advising, and so on. For any activity at Canisius do not use a non-Canisius or personal account. This helps recipients easily identify you and prevents your email from being stopped by spam filters.
For matters unrelated to Canisius, such as shopping, banking, corresponding with friends, and so on, use a non-Canisius email address. This keeps your professional and private lives separate, and keeps consistent in various non-Canisius matters after you graduate.
If you are a full-time student, check your Canisius email at least once a day.
Give professors, staff, and other students time to respond to your email. They are busy, too, and may need hours or days to compose a proper and complete response.
When emailing a professor, use the title "professor" or, if appropriate, "Dr.", and their last name. For example, "Hello Dr. Argwhal," or "Dear Professor DuBois," are appropriate greetings. When addressing staff, use Mr. or Ms. and their last name. Do not assume you are on a first-name basis with any faculty or staff, and always include a greeting.
In the subject line, be concise and specific: what are you asking about? Don't be wordy and don't begin what is really your message (body text) in the subject line. But don't leave it blank, either. Readers use subject lines to quickly determine what they need to address, and if yours is vague, they may be slower in replying.
Set up a signature block in your email that has your first and last name, together with other relevant professional information you choose, such as student organization affiliation or graduation year. This looks professional and helps professors, staff, and fellow students correctly spell your full name. Also include pronouns, for example: (she/her/hers).
Want a video?: Create a Signature - Transcript
Emails are not text messages. Do not use slang or acronyms (for example "lol"). Before sending, determine all that you need to say or ask, and include it in a single email, rather than sending a stream of semi-connected emails?
Can you find the answer already on the web? Such as in the syllabus? Do not bother others with questions that are easily answered on your own.
Keep fonts, signature logos, and backgrounds simple. Often, fancier fonts and images don't appear properly to recipients. Sticking with default fonts and backgrounds, and a simple signature block, is most professional.
When replying, always take a quick look to ensure you are replying to all past recipients ("Reply All"), or only a single recipient. Choose the most appropriate in each situation.
Archive and label email. Delete any that are no longer necessary, but save any that could be relevant in the future, if only as a record. Don't let your inbox become a giant mess of old emails.
Email and D2L
Here's some tips for using email together with features in D2L
You can email anyone in your classes, including professors, directly in D2L. Go the classlist, and click their name. While D2L can send email, it does not receive email so you don't check your email there. If you send from D2L, it looks to any recipients as if you simply emailed them from your @canisius.edu address. If they reply to you, it goes to your @canisius.edu gmail inbox.
When you submit an assignment to a D2L dropbox, D2L emails you a receipt that reports when and where you submitted the assignment. Archive it in case there is a problem.
You can set up notifications so D2L will email you if, for example, a professor adds or updates your grade in the grade report, or someone responds to your discussion post. Within D2L, lick your name in the upper right, and choose Notifications from the dropdown menu.
You can find Google Apps tutorials, including tips for Gmail, linked in the Quick Guide, and here.