October 10, 2025

Today’s letter contains some guidance for us. You may have heard of the term “Dear Colleague” letter. In a sense, today’s letter is kind of like one of those. “Dear Colleague” letters have been used for decades to share official information from various departments or agencies, like the Department of Education. Today, it does not come from the federal government, but from input by our Attorney General’s Office, the Cascadia Executive Team, and the College Advisory Council.

Topic #1: Email Signature

According to the Washington Administrative Code [WAC 292-110-010 (3)(a)(vii)], emails using state platforms will not support, promote the interests of, or solicit for an outside organization or group.

That means that none of our email signatures should contain links to any other organization outside of our own Cascadia domain. I kindly ask that anyone with such links please remove them.

The reason for this law lies in the thought that the government can’t be seen as promoting the interests of other organizations, no matter how just the organization is.

As our governance groups discussed email signature content over the last week, we decided to outline additional guidance without getting too prescriptive. This guidance refers to the content of your self-designed signature which goes at the end of your correspondence.

• First, we generally recommend that good practice could include the Cascadia logo, your name and position, your pronouns, a link to the Cascadia webpage, a phone number, and a confidentiality statement if necessary. We believe that multilingual name pronunciations are acceptable.
• We also know that office hours or methods to reach you may be important. Remember to keep it succinct.
• Please remember that your email represents Cascadia, so our personal belief systems and motivators (like quotes) should be kept minimal. People are mostly interested in the content of your email, so when the signature lines are longer than the content, we can get out of balance.
• Please remember your audience. Internal emails may not always need your signature content. There is the ability within Outlook to turn on signature content email-by-email.
• Remember that we all sometimes have to read through long chains of email correspondence. When the signature content is also long, that can make it difficult.
• We recommend that departmental teams discuss consistency in your next staff meeting. Do all the Advisors, or all the Enrollment Services Specialist, or all the IT Technicians need the same signature? Have that discussion and each team can decide for themselves.

Meagan Walker and Jenny Piper (jpiper@cascadia.edu) are available to help if you need a template or want to discuss the design of your signature content.

Topic #2: a SECOND important issue that has started to appear on campus.

Across the nation, groups of varying political, philosophical, and social identities are attending college fairs, free speech zones, and open access events. These groups may not align with your own personal value system, but please know that Cascadia respects the right of every group and individual to express their protected free speech when they follow our prescribed protocols. See WAC 132Z-142 as a guiding document: Use of College Facilities for Expressive Activities.

We want to make sure that employees and students who choose to engage these varying perspectives do so with respect and civility. If you question the legitimacy of a group or individual to be on campus, please connect with your supervisor. If you don’t agree with a group or individual’s philosophy, we ask that you either walk by or engage in a calm and respectful manner, without escalating a situation. Please be aware that some individuals or groups may attempt to provoke reactions and may record interactions for public sharing. It’s important that we remain professional and composed in these moments. We do not want to be featured negatively in such recordings.

Civil rights are important to us. Please think about how you represent Cascadia anytime a situation arises when you are personally challenged and understand that the college will protect the rights of people to properly engage in speech, even if different than your own.

We appreciate everyone helping us to be our best in both of today’s topics.

Shoutouts

From the IN Box:

We are grateful for a day of celebration at the re-opening of the Inclusion and Advocacy Center this week. It was wonderful to be in community with so many of you. We could not have done it without the warm help of many. A heartfelt thank you from our team to the Cascadia community, in particular:

• Shawna, Miles, April, and Bee, UW facilities (thank you, Matt and Steffan), Cascadia custodians (thank you, Lorena and Maria),
• the IP team (thank you, Amy!),
• Shandy and Sam,
• the IT team (thank you, Tonio, Anthony, Joz, and Luke).

Shoutouts can be sent to FLShoutout@cascadia.edu.

Have a great weekend.