Apparently several ISPs (yahoo, hotmail, gmail, and AOL, to name a few) have been adjusting the filtering system at their server levels to meet various federal standards as well as increase their security and address spam problems.  This is being done on the free email accounts only according to my information.  This causes problems when your instructor is trying to email you and is being rejected/forbidden from sending that email.  To compound the problem, yahoo and hotmail do not send out their undeliverable messages for several days, if at all, so we may have no way of knowing that the email didn't get to you.  We have been suspicious (but yet to be confirmed) that we are not receiving some of those emails sent by students from these free accounts as well and, likewise, you would not know that because you would not get an undeliverable message and/or it would be drastically delayed.  Even setting your ISP spam filters does not help since they are blocked from their mail server before they reach you.

We do highly recommend that you do not use these free accounts for your course work and that you remember our suggestion to always contact your instructor by phone if they have not responded to your email or assignment/test submission within a timely manner (72 hours (excluding weekends) for emails and 5 working days for tests/assignments).

Thanks for listening!

03/0608 Addendum:  Recent information from students indicates that accounts like yahoo have been having difficulties recently, even if they are paid accounts and not just the free ones and even if they are run through Outlook and not through the web.  Apparently companies like yahoo are making additional changes now to ensure a safer email and those of you using Outlook for these accounts may need to change from a POP3 to an SMTP address for outgoing mail.  If you are finding that you are not receiving emails that you are expecting, be sure to contact yahoo (or the like) for support.  In addition, keep in mind that web-based email accounts have been known to change spacing and formatting in attached documents, which may be an issue with submitting tests and assignments.  Isn't technology grand!


Each day is a gift, so make the most of it!!!

Kathy Kropko, CMT, AHDI-F