A. Google Apps is a free collaboration and communication suite of applications for educational institutions. It allows Sunshine Coast TAFE to provide web based tools such as Email, Calendar and other online based tools with Institute branding. The Google for Education service is being used by millions of students around the world, notably in Australa by the entire Department of Education in NSW (around 1.5 Million users), Macquarie University, University of Adelaide and more signing on.

A. Sunshine Coast TAFE strives to continuously improve services to students and Google Apps enables us to provide you with:

• A huge mailbox (7GB and continually growing)
• Larger upload sizes for file attachments
• Integration of several functions such as email, calendar and document sharing

Sunshine Coast TAFE wants to promote student online communities and collaboration while studying with us. We have some other great ideas about how to do this beyond our Google project, but we'd also like to hear from you - if you have found a social network or online tool that is handy, let us know!

A. You will be able to sign in to your Gmail and other Google Apps now. For newly enrolled students, access will occur within 24 hours of you recieveing your student number.

A. Sunshine Coast TAFE will provide an iGoogle like Student Portal, Gmail, Calendar, Online Documents (Docs) and Contacts features to Students as part of the Google Apps implementation. Web based access to email allows for easy access from any computer with internet access and a web browser. In addition, students will have access to Google's Calendar feature, which integrates fully with the new student Gmail platform. Other applications via Google like Instant Messaging and Google Sites are being reviewed for possible future implementation.

A. Your email address will still be studentnumber@sunshinecoasttafe.edu.au (eg. 01234567@sunshinecoasttafe.edu.au).

A. No. The Gmail account you will be provided with as part of the Google Apps implementation is a Sunshine Coast TAFE account and is therefore separate from your personal Gmail account. However you may be able to set up a rule to forward your TAFE emails to your personal Gmail account. Tutorials (available shortly) will guide you through this process.

A. Google takes users' privacy seriously and has implemented a range of leading edge protections (anti-virus, anti-spam) to safeguard data stored on its servers. Sunshine Coast TAFE has agreed to accept the standard Google terms and conditions which includes reference to its privacy policy. To view the policy details, please click on the following link: Google Education Privacy Policy. To summarise, Sunshine Coast TAFE and Google takes the privacy and security of our students/users data very seriously. A few main points to consider are:

• Google and Sunshine Coast TAFE does not own your data.
• Google and Sunshine Coast TAFE does not share your data. There are a few exceptions in the Privacy Policy (court order, imminent threat to life) that only in specific circumstances Sunshine Coast TAFE can administrate.
• Google and Sunshine Coast TAFE keeps the data as long as you want.
• Sunshine Coast TAFE (as administrators of the Google system in this case) can delete the data when you ask, or remove your account.

A. Our account creation system is fully automated and feeds off a small amount of data already held in our Student Tracking System. As all students will therefore have an account it gives Sunshine Coast TAFE a guaranteed method of communicating with all of its students when necessary. It is also a great addition to your suite of tools available as part of your study with us. We'd also encourage you to keep the account to communicate with your classmates, collaborate on docs, share calendar events and maintain contacts that you make during your course of study.

A. Students can create "send email as" by following this article:

Changing your username and

..and can "kind of" create alias names, but this isn't support very well by gmail unfortunately. See this article:

Using an address alias