Consolidating to UMD G Suite

What and why? 

The Smith School is consolidating email services provided to our students to the University's UMD G Suite offering. Faculty and Staff were moved to UMD G Suite in the summer of 2020  as mandated by University policies, and it is now time to have our students consolidate on the same platform. All Graduate students already have accounts on the UMD G Suite that are accessed with the University Directory ID and password. For Alumni who graduated in 2021 or earlier, please see this page for how this affects your account.

This change will align the Smith School with the best practices of the University of Maryland. Until the summer of 2020 the faculty and student body shared the same communication platform for decades, allowing ease of collaboration and communication. While we had attempted to keep the Smith branded email solutions going for our student community, it has become clear over time that with multiple mail systems not all messages were being read by all recipients in a timely manner.

As the UMD G Suite and MarylandSmith platforms offer the exact same set of services, it has been decided to eliminate any potential impediments to communication, therefore we will be consolidating email to simplify where and how students receive their communications, with all messages being delivered to the campus UMD G Suite system.

One mailbox, one login, one place to read messages.

How and when?

We will be consolidating email services for students to their UMD G Suite mailbox, starting on Wednesday August 10th. 

From that date onwards, all email sent to your username@marylandsmith.umd.edu address will be automatically forwarded to your DirectoryID@umd.edu email address, which for current Smith Grad students will be delivered to your University UMD G Suite mailbox. While you should already be familiar with your UMD G Suite mailbox and logging in and using it, here's a direct link to help you login with your University Directory ID: https://mail.google.com/a/umd.edu.

If you had previously set up a mail rule in your UMD G Suite mailbox to forward your messages to your MarylandSmith mailbox, we will automatically disable that mail rule for you on Wednesday August 10th .

You will still be able to login to your MarylandSmith G Suite account through January 31st 2023 to see old data that you have saved there, such as Google Drive files, old emails, etc. We strongly advise that you transfer your data from your MarylandSmith account to the UMD G Suite account, using the tool set at https://takeout.google.com/transfer?hl=en. See this KB article here https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/6386856 for more information on transferring your data and this page for an example of the process.

We will deactivate your MarylandSmith G Suite account on January 31st, 2023 so please make sure you have transferred your files and data to your UMD G Suite account by that time or downloaded any data that did not transfer. Note that your @marylandsmith.umd.edu will continue to forward email to your @umd.edu after this date. See the FAQ below for more information.

Frequently asked questions

Why am I unable to login to my MarylandSmith account starting from January 31st, 2023?
Your account was removed on January 31st, 2023 per the information on this website and the notice sent by the Masters Program Office in August 2022. This was ample time to backup, transfer or download information that you wanted to keep. 

What do I do if I want to provide a new or changed forwarding address after January 31st, 2023?

After January 31st 2023 you will need to contact the Office of Development and Alumni Relations via alumni@rhsmith.umd.edu. They will verify your identity and collect the desired personal destination address and pass that onto the internal team at Smith IT for actioning. Please do not reach out directly to the Office of Smith IT, as they do not have access to your records to be able to appropriately verify your identity and will direct you the DAR to perform the steps in the prior sentence. 

If I transfer my Google Drive and emails to UMD G Suite, will I need to share them again?

Yes, the transfer process *copies* your files, in your UMD G Suite they will be "new" files that you will need to share with others again.

When I transfer my Google Drive and email data, do my Google Photos transfer as well? What about Youtube videos? 

Neither Google Photos or Youtube videos will transfer. You can download data from your MarylandSmith account using the procedure detailed in this help article from Google https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3024190.  We have also described the process on this page here.

I have a lot of data in my MarylandSmith account, will I be able to copy it to my personal Gmail account? 

By default a personal Gmail account comes with only 15Gb of storage space. If you have more than that amount of data stored in your MarylandSmith account then you will not be able to successfully transfer your data to your personal Gmail account. You could if you desire purchase additional storage from Google for your personal Gmail account, or instead download your data in archives to your personal computer for you to decide what to do with later. See this page on information on downloading your data using Google Takeout.

Can I copy my MarylandSmith calendar to my UMD G Suite calendar?

Yes, you can export your Google calendar from a computer (sorry, it is not possible do this with either a phone or tablet) and import it to your UMD G Suite account using this help article from Google https://support.google.com/calendar/answer/37118  

Can Smith IT help me copy my data to my UMD G Suite account or elsewhere?

Unfortunately no, quite apart from the number of users who need to move, we do not have access to your UMD G Suite account, nor can we assist with personal email accounts that you may decide to transfer your data to. We can link you to the Google help articles, but you would need to self-move your data, or download the data to store offline for later use. 

What if I do not move my data before January 31st 2023, what will happen to it?

Your MarylandSmith account data will be deleted and will not be recoverable. Please ensure you have either migrated it to your UMD G Suite and/or downloaded a copy using Google Takeout. 

What happens to mail sent to my @marylandsmith.umd.edu address after January 31st 2023?

We will continue to forward anything sent to your username@marylandsmith.umd.edu account to your directoryID@umd.edu address. Your directoryID@umd.edu email address delivers mail to your UMD G Suite account until approximately two semesters after graduation, at which time the University will deliver your email to your Terpmail account.  See the next FAQ answer for more information.

After I graduate, what happens to my UMD G Suite account then?

The University will continue to provide your UMD G Suite account for two  additional semesters after graduation. After that the University will automatically forward your directoryid@umd.edu address to your Terpmail account, which is also based on Google Workspace for Education. Your UMD G Suite account will be removed at this time(this means your emails and Google Drive documents for example stored in that account will be deleted).  Note that this action does not remove your University email address, only the UMD G Suite mailbox. We strongly recommend you back up or transfer your data from your UMD G Suite account after graduation to be sure it's not lost when the automatic removal process happens. You could transfer your UMD G Suite data to Terpmail, or out to another location, such as your own personal Gmail account, Dropbox, OneDrive, etc. using whatever method you choose.  Given the limited storage in Terpmail we recommend transferring a copy of your data elsewhere.

Can I copy my Google Photos stored in my MarylandSmith account?
You can export your Google Photos using the Takeout method as described on this page here. Alternatively if you have a personal Gmail account and sufficient space to store a copy of your photos, you can also use Partner Sharing to share out all your photos from your MarylandSmith account to your personal one, and then save them in it. See this help article from Google called Set up partner sharing and complete the section under Share photos with a partner, sharing out from your MarylandSmith account to your personal Gmail account. Once you have completed the sharing (recommended to share all photos from a long time ago), you must expand the section on that page that says Find your partners photos and complete the Save your partners photos. If you fail to do this, the photos will disappear when the MarylandSmith account is removed on January 31st, 2023. 

Where will my MarylandSmith email address deliver mail to once I graduate?

Your MarylandSmith email address will continue to forward to your UMD email address, so wherever you set that to go, that's where you'll find your Smith messages. If you transfer to Terpmail, then your messages will get delivered there. If after graduation you forward your DirectoryID@umd.edu address to your personal email, that’s where your MarylandSmith email will be sent.