Appalachian Announcements (Announce) is a message board for App State faculty and staff announcements.
A team in University Communications moderates or reviews all messages before they are posted to the message archive.
Group members receive a curated digest of approved messages weekly on Tuesday and can read recent messages at any time.
Group Membership
All active faculty and staff are automatically subscribed to the Announce group.
Students do not receive these messages. Students, including most student employees, and external email accounts (family, friends) cannot be added to the group membership.
In some cases, App State generic email accounts can be added to the group membership. To request addition of a generic email account, contact ucomm@appstate.edu.
Message Guidelines
All group members can submit appropriate messages for moderation (review/approval). Messages should be relevant to App State employees and related to university business or activities.
Messages that are not accessible or fail to comply with university brand guidelines will be rejected. See “Reasons for Rejection” below for additional details.
Refrain from submitting messages:
- for students;
- related to unauthorized business usage, political campaigns, and/or personal advertising; and
- with attachments (PDFs or Google Slides/PowerPoint presentations), as these may not be accessible.
Write Your Message
Considered and well-written subject lines and messages are more likely to be opened and read.
- Easily scannable, text-based messages are preferred. Avoid all caps and limit use of bolded text.
- Write a descriptive subject line.Only the subject line is included in the digest; therefore, it should be descriptive and concise. Examples:
- Register for [name of workshop], [date], [time], [location]
- [Name of event/meeting], [date], [time], [location]
- Detour notice for [name of road], [start date] to [end date]
- Volunteer at [name of event], [date], [time], [location]
- Apply/nominate for [name of award/program/grant] by [date]
- Keep it short! Only include critical information and clearly define the connection to university business or activities.
- Link, don’t repeat. Link to a page and/or news/event post on an App State website to provide more information.
- Make it accessible.
- Avoid emoji and images/graphics unless they are critical to the message. Images/graphics must be accompanied by descriptive text (alt text).
- Use descriptive links — avoid linking “here” or “click here.”
- Linked videos must be captioned.
- Do not attach or link PDFs or presentations.
- Check for errors. Review your message carefully for spelling and grammatical errors, dates/times and check all links.
Submit Your Message
Submit subject lines/messages for moderation exactly as they should appear using one of these methods:
From your @appstate.edu email account: Send an email to announce@appstate.edu.
Note: Use this option if submitting a message from a mobile device.From the Announce website:
Select “Post a message” and you will be taken to the message archive.
Select “New conversation” from the top left corner to compose your message.
Hit “Post message” when ready to send for review.
When you submit a message, it does not immediately post to the message archive.
- Instead, group moderators are notified that your message is ready to review.
- You will not be notified when your message moves to the moderation queue.
- Submit your message by 8 a.m. on Tuesday to have it reviewed/moderated for inclusion in the weekly digest. See “Announce Digest” below for additional details.
Message Moderation
Moderators are notified when a message is submitted — they can only “approve” or “reject” messages. They cannot:
- Edit subject lines or message text.
- Check all details/links for accuracy.
- Resubmit messages on your behalf.
Messages are moderated on workdays. Messages are not moderated on weekends, during university closures or on holidays.
When your message is approved, you will receive an email notification.
Reasons for Rejection
- The subject line is not descriptive or does not relate to the message.
- The subject line/message has significant spelling/grammatical errors and/or other errors such as incorrect dates/times.
- The message is not accessible.
- The message includes attachments.
- The message is intended for students*.
- The message does not meet university brand guidelines.
- The message is promoting an event/meeting that has already taken place and/or is not sponsored by a campus area/department/organization.
- The message is not related to university business or activities.
- The message relates to unauthorized business usage, political campaigns or personal advertising.
- The submission is a duplicate, reply or forwarded message.
*Note: If your intention is for employees to share the message with students, please clearly note that at the top of the message body.
What happens if your message is rejected?
You will receive a notification that your message has been rejected and a reminder of common rejection reasons. Correct the message and resubmit it for moderation.
What if you need to revise an approved message?
Contact ucomm@appstate.edu to request deletion of an approved message. Then, revise the message and resubmit it for moderation.
Announce Digest
A curated digest of approved messages is sent weekly on Tuesdays. Messages posted by 8 a.m. each Tuesday are moderated for the weekly digest.
The Announce digest includes the subject line of each approved message and a link to the full message. Messages are sorted into these categories:
- Announcements
- Faculty Notices
- Grants, Research and Calls for Submissions
- Health and Wellness
- Meetings
- On the Hickory Campus
- Upcoming Events
- Workshops and Professional Development
Categories may be added/deleted as necessary.
Members must be logged into their App State Google account to view linked messages and/or the message archive.
Resources and Questions
This service adheres to these policies:
Contact University Communications at ucomm@appstate.edu with questions, for assistance or to request deletion of an approved message.
Updated March 14, 2025