The Department of Education (DepEd) continues with its aim of improving governance by providing tools that promote a culture of collaboration and communication and improve the performance of tasks. With this, the Department of Education provides employees, teachers, and students with access to twenty-first-century tools that support education and its delivery. Included in this online education package are tools for email, productivity, and collaboration.

Users will have access to the following tools:

G Suite for Education
Microsoft 365 Education

All regular employees and public school learners of the Department of Education shall be assigned a G Suite for Education and a Microsoft 365 Education user account.

Consultants and Contract of Service personnel in the Central, Regional, or Division Office may be assigned their respective user accounts upon the request of their immediate heads of unit and subject to the discretion and approval of the assigned User Account Administrators in each governance level. The request shall be based on the need of the said individuals for official user accounts in the performance of their duties.

Employee, consultants, and contract of service personnel accounts must be secured from the assigned User Account Administrator of each governance level.

Table of Contents

DepEd Email Standard Naming Convention

The standard naming convention for employees, consultants, and contract of service personnel shall be:

a. G Suite for Education:

<first name>.<last name>@deped.gov.ph

b. Microsoft 365 for Education:

For Central, Regional, and Division Office Personnel:

<first name>.<last name> @deped.gov.ph

For School personnel:

<first name>.<last name>@<regional tenant>.deped.gov.ph

c. If the username is no longer available in G Suite for Education, the User Account Administrator must append a sequential number after the last name. The Microsoft 365 Education user account name must follow the same as the G Suite for Education user account name.

Public school learner accounts shall be created by the ICTS based on the Learner Information System. These accounts shall be distributed through the Division Information Technology Officer and the School ICT coordinator, in a process they deem appropriate, strictly adhering to data privacy rules and guidelines.

The standard naming convention for the public school learner accounts shall be:

<Learner Reference Number>@<regional tenant>.deped.gov.ph

Upon receipt of account credentials, all users must immediately access their accounts thru accounts.google.com for G Suite for Education and portal.office.com for Microsoft 365 Education.

Upon signing in, all users must ensure that their self-service password recovery is set up by accessing the following pages:

a. G Suite for Education – https://myaccount.google.com/security

b. Microsoft 365 Education – https://myaccount.microsoft.com/

Users having difficulties accessing their user account may request technical assistance from their assigned User Account Administrator. For password reset, the user must utilize the self-service password reset facility before contacting their administrator.

Roles and Responsibilities

Administrators

The Super Administrators manage the policies, configuration and user accounts for both G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education across all the tenants in the organization. This task is assigned to the ICTS – Solutions Development Division.

Helpdesk Administrators are authorized to manage DepEd user accounts. Their main responsibility is to perform user account management actions that require bulk processing, escalation or higher level rights and permissions than those provided to User Account Administrators, following existing policies, guidelines and conventions on managing user accounts. This tasked is assigned to ICTS.

User Account Administrators are tasked to manage user accounts in their respective governance levels.

This role is assigned to:

a. ICTS for Central Office
b. Regional Information Technology Officers for Regional Office employees
c. Division Information Technology Officers for Schools Division Office employees and school-level personnel

Following the policies and procedures set by the ICTS Director and the Super Administrator/s, their responsibilities include:

a. Account creation. Create G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education user accounts for personnel as described in item 3 and item 4 in this policy. In the creation of user accounts, all information required must be complete and accurate.

The naming convention of the user account must adhere to item 6 of this policy.

b. Password reset. Reset the password of users who experience difficulties in recovering their password thru the self-service password recovery facilities.

c. Suspension. When persons are suspended or are separated, pending the accomplishment of clearances, or other analogous instances, the personnel officer shall inform the User Accounts Administrator so that the latter can suspend the user account or otherwise prevent unauthorized access to the same.

Likewise, upon notice from the personnel officer, when the cause for account suspension has been resolved or remedied, the User Account Administrator shall restore account access.

d. Deletion. Individuals who are no longer connected with DepEd by reason of resignation, transfer of office, retirement or other causes of termination or suspension of service shall be prohibited access through account deletion within 90 to 180 days.

The User Account Administrator shall use his/her G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education account in performing the different user account management procedures.

The ITO may delegate one other personnel from the same governance level to assist in the performance of his/her duties as a User Account Administrator. However, the accountability for actions performed remains with the ITO.

To delegate an alternate User Account administrator and in the event that a new Information Technology Officer is assigned in the Regional or Division Office, the Super Administrators must be notified immediately thru email via icts.sdd@deped.gov.ph. Details must include the name, plantilla position and official DepEd email of the alternate or new User Account Administrator.

The School Administrators serve as the school-based administrators that handle concerns such as ensuring that the user accounts are distributed to learners and resetting of user account passwords.

The School Administrator shall use the appropriate school accounts in resetting of user account passwords.

All administrators shall act as champions on the proper use of both G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education accounts.

Users

All users, at all levels of the organization and in schools, must ensure the safekeeping of their respective user accounts.

Strictly follow the acceptable use and prohibited use guidelines.

The employee and his/her supervisor must ensure that all files and important correspondences are properly turned over before effective date of transfer resignation, or retirement.

Acceptable Use

Use

i. The use of these accounts shall be for educational purposes and/or the performance of official duties and responsibilities.

ii. Reasonable use of the service for personal electronic correspondence is acceptable. However, strict professional discretion is expected to be employed at all times. DepEd personnel shall act professionally and shall be bound by the provisions of the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public Officials and Employees (R.A. 6713)

iii. It is highly recommended that personal correspondences and files be saved in a separate location.

Prohibited Use

The G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education are government services obtained in the interest of education and public service. Transmission and storage of offensive, disruptive, discriminatory, pornographic, profane, abusive, libelous, derogatory, illegal, and otherwise similar material unbecoming of learners and agents of the civil service are strictly prohibited.

The account shall not be used in connection with any commercial, religious, social, political, and other similar interests.

Disclosure of confidential and sensitive personal information is strictly prohibited unless it is required by duty or assignment.

Sharing of account credentials with other individuals and organizations is strictly prohibited.

Use of the account to access illegal content or to access content (e.g. copyrighted information) in a manner that violates the law is likewise stringently forbidden.

The introduction, intentional or otherwise, of any form of computer virus or malware, may it be from an email attachment or external link to a file, is also strictly prohibited.

Each individual is responsible for any information or statement sent out from his or her own account, making him or her liable for violations stated in this policy.

Protection Against Liability

Appropriate discretion shall be applied in terms of representations, claims and disclosures made through the G Suite and Microsoft 365 official DepEd email account.

In the spirit of email risk awareness and to mitigate the possible liability, the inclusion of the following disclaimer in the signature line of all communications sent through the email service of G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education is automatically included:

“This communication may contain confidential or privileged information, and is intended solely for the individual or entity to whom it is originally addressed. Any disclosure, copying, dissemination, or any action taken in reliance to it by others, other than the intended recipient, is strictly prohibited. The opinions, conclusions and statements expressed in this message are those of the sender and may not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of Education.”

Privacy and Monitoring

The privacy of every individual user shall be respected as a strict general policy. Supervision of accounts shall only be undertaken upon a finding of probable cause indicating a breach of the safe, proper, and reasonable use of the deped.gov.ph service or a violation of any law or other rules or regulations as possibly evidenced by contents processed through the deped.gov.ph service, as determined by the DepEd Executive Committee (ExeCom).

The individual shall be informed that the account will be subject for investigation and of the reason behind it.

The contents of the deped.gov.ph service are considered confidential government communication. To protect confidentiality of the email messages, security measures such as HTTPS, IMAP and PKI digital certificates shall be used to encrypt or secure the connection and messages sent and received through the deped.gov.ph service.

All data, information, and communication sent, received, or archived in the G Suite for Education and Microsoft 365 Education belong to the government.

Enforcement

In the event that the prohibited acts stated in Section 10.b of this Policy are violated, formal complaints may be lodged with the User Account Administrator. This shall be done in coordination with the appropriate Division, Regional, Central DepEd Legal Officer against individual users, whether they are still connected with DepEd or not, and upon a determination by the super administrators that there is a probable cause to rely on the validity and veracity of the allegations contained therein.

Any user found guilty of violating, intentional or otherwise, the policies stated herein shall be subject to disciplinary action, without prejudice to such other civil, administrative, and penal remedies as the gravity of the violation may merit.

The specific disciplinary action to be meted out shall be determined by the appropriate DepEd official, in consultation with the unit head of the person at fault.

READ: DepEd Step-by-Step Guide on the Activation of Learners’ Microsoft 365 Accounts