[students] Death Notification

Ed Board knows that nothing cheers a person up more than seeing that in their inbox.

Seriously, why do we need to know when some geriatric who hasn’t taught here since the Reagan administration croaks?

It’s a waste of everyone’s time. It wastes the time of the person who writes, addresses and sends it. It wastes students’ time removing it from their inboxes. It wastes the time of everyone involved.

In the case of the sender, since the University is paying him or her, wasting of time also means wasting of money. Specifically, a waste of your tuition dollars.

Ed board can only guess as to the motives of the administration in implementing the death-mail policy. Wouldn’t it be much more pertinent to send the message to the mass mailing address of [alumni]?

Ed Board can only posit that this was the university’s original intent. However since many alumni graduated before the advent of e-mail as a means of communication, they do not have email addresses on file.

Perhaps the University expected a trickle up effect as students passed the email to alumni or parents.

Ed Board doubts the likelihood of this method. When the professor hasn’t taught for the last two decades, then the trickle-up effect could only work with parents. Now, who knows the name of any of their parents’ professors?

Does anyone know an SMU grad more than four years older than you? Now, what is the likelihood that that grad knows an alumnus more than fours years older than he or she is?

Face it, the farthest the trickle-up could go back is 8 years.

All the graduates in the last eight years have had email addresses and are in the [alumni group]!

Having to spend the time sorting out useless emails is a waste. And on the off chance that it is someone that you know, like a current teacher, you have to look at each one.

They’re also depressing. “Oh great, somebody else died…” That can be a major downer during the course of your day.

Ed Board suggests that the administration use a program that matches up the deceased professor with the email addresses of his or her current and former students. That would save everyone time.

For professors who haven’t taught in decades, students shouldn’t be receiving that information. Send it to alumni who are in contact with the school.