POLICIES

The creation of outlines, guides, exams, other learning and teaching materials, and administrative materials of a printed or other nature shall be a normal part of the content and function of any teaching/instructional or administrative position at Eastern International College. Any such learning, teaching, or administrative materials produced by an employee of Eastern International College in the normal course of his/her work shall be the property of and copyright of Eastern International College. Any copyright applied for and secured in relationship to such materials shall be the property of Eastern International College. Employees are not permitted to use such materials for any reason outside of their employment with Eastern International College. Additionally, upon an employee’s resignation or an employee’s termination of employment with Eastern International College, such employee is not permitted to use such learning and teaching materials and/or administrative materials created while in Eastern International College’s employ. Violation of this policy shall result in disciplinary action, including possible termination, and/or legal action against the employee or former employee, depending upon the circumstances.

Social Media Policy

Eastern International College recognizes the importance of social media as a communication tool. Employees should also keep in mind that once information appears online, it becomes part of a permanent record, even if it is later deleted. Everything written on the Internet leaves a digital footprint that can be traced back to its author. To that end, this Policy establishes the position for the College on the use of social media for the official business purposes of Eastern International College, including the promotion of the College, departments and offices, programming, faculty and staff.

Policies

This policy applies to the College community including, but not limited to, administrators, faculty (including non-compensated faculty), and staff. The College respects your right to interact knowledgeably and socially, however interaction with social media can greatly impact you, our colleagues and our students. Therefore, the entire College community has a responsibility to maintain the integrity of the institution no matter where, when or how they interact with social media.

Any social media postings by an employee shall be consistent with the College’s policies including, but not limited to, the College’s anti-harassment and non-discrimination policies as well as the College’s policies regarding the non-disclosure of private and confidential information pursuant to Federal and State laws. The Campus Director is responsible for the enforcement of this policy and can be a resource to the College community for launching social media initiatives. The College has the right to amend this policy at any time. Failure to comply with this policy will be considered actionable behavior by senior management and could result in disciplinary action up to and including suspension or termination, and in some cases civil and/or criminal liability.

When communicating in social media, employees must act at their own peril. Employees must never engage in communication which injures the reputation of the College or its students or which discloses confidential information. The employee’s position at the College may be impacted by their personal internet present and activities.

For the purpose of this policy, “social media” refers to, but is not limited to following:

1. Social Media Channels: Blogs (web-based journals), micro-blogs(e.g. Tumblr), wikis(e.g., Wikipedia, etc.), social networks(e.g. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, social bookmarking services, podcasts (multimedia distributed over the internet), video sharing (e.g., YouTube), and photo sharing (e.g. Instagram) user rating services and any other online collaboration, sharing or publishing platform, whether accessed through the web, a mobile device, text messaging, email or any other existing or emerging communications platform.

2. Social Media Account: A personalized presence inside a social networking channel, initiated at will by an individual. YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and other social networking channels allow users to sign-up for their own social media account, which the user can use to collaborate, interact and share content and status updates. When a user communicates through a social media account, their disclosures are attributed to their User Profile.

3. Social Media Disclosures: Blog posts, blog comments, status updates, text messages, posts via email, images, audio recordings, video recordings or any other information made available through a social media channel. Social media disclosures are the actual communications a user distributes through a social media channel, usually by means of their social media account.

4. External vs. Internal Social Media Channels: External social media channels are social media services that do not reside at a domain. Internal social media channels are located at a company- owned domain, require a password to access and are only visible to employees and other approved individuals.

5. User Profile: Social Media Account holders customize their User Profile within a Social Media Channel with specific information about themselves which can be made available others users.

6. Copyright: Copyright protects the right of an author to control the reproduction and use of any creative expression that has been fixed in tangible form, such as literary works, graphical works, photographic works, audiovisual works, electronic works and musical works. It is illegal to reproduce and use copyrighted material through social media channels without the permission of the copyright owner.

7. Hosted Content: Text, pictures, audio, video or other information in digital form that is uploaded and resides in the social media account of the author of a social media disclosure. If you download content off of the Internet, and then upload it to your social media account, you are hosting that content. This distinction is important because it is generally illegal to host copyrighted content publicly on the Internet without first obtaining the permission of the copyright owner.

8. Embed Codes: Unique codes that are provided to entice others to share online content without requiring the sharer to host that content. By means of an embed code, it is possible to display a YouTube user’s video in someone else’s social media account without requiring that person to host the source video file. This distinction is important because embed codes are often used by copyright owners to encourage others to share their content via social media channels.

9. Controversial Issues: Issues that form the basis of heated debate, often identified in political campaigns as wedge issues, since they provoke a strong emotional response. Examples include political views, health care reform, gun control and abortion. Religious beliefs may also be controversial, particularly to those intolerant of beliefs different from their own.

10. Official Content: Publicly available online content created and made public by our company, verified by virtue of the fact that it is accessible through our corporate website.

11. Inbound Links: An inbound link is a hyperlink that transits from one domain to another. A hyperlink that transits from an external domain to your own domain is referred to as inbound link. Inbound links are important because they play a role in how search engines rank pages and domains in search results.

12. Link Bartering Exchanges: Trading or purchasing inbound links from other domains exclusively for the purposes of lifting your domain in search engine page results.

13. Tweets and Retweets: A tweet is a 140 character social media disclosure distributed on the Twitter micro-blogging service. Retweets are tweets from one Twitter user that are redistributed by another Twitter user. Retweets are how information propagates on Twitter.

The absence of, or lack of explicit reference to a specific site does not limit the extent of the application of this policy.