A recent article in The Chronicle — Email is for Old People? — outlines the common fight on every campus…communicating effectively with current students.

In most electronic relationships that I have with organizations, they ask me how they can communicate with me. I provide an email address, a cell number, an address. Something that lets them know where to find me if I need to hear from them. Why not in higher education?

The increase in alert systems for emergencies on campus lends me to believe it’s time to broaden the scope of these systems. If they are good enough for class cancellations, then they are probably good enough for daily updates…specific to the student.

At orientation, let the students tell you — individually — how they want to hear from you. Then, allow them to change their mind online. Some colleges are starting this. But I say that every college that is complaining about students not checking their campus email should climb aboard.

A nice morning rant to a lingering pet peeve of mine. Fix your problem.