Social Media Guidelines

The University of Jaffna gives its best to maintain a safe community that nurtures an enabling environment to express independent views on social media while upholding our university’s global reputation. University students are expected to follow social media platforms adopting the highest ethical and behavioral standards as per university social media guidelines. It covers appropriate best practices when you share your ideas as an individual or a group, on dynamic and socially interactive applications such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Tumblr, Instagram, Twitter, Viber, LinkedIn, Telegram, Blogs, YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, etc.

  1. As a registered student of the University of Jaffna, you are kindly requested to protect and safeguard the reputation of our University. If you are not satisfied with some services, rules/regulations of the university, or staff members, you can communicate your concerns to your counsellors, academic coordinators/tutors, or other officials of the university and seek a feasible solution. Problems cannot be solved by criticizing on social media alone.
  2. When you are sharing a post of some other people (friends or third parties) in social media, you must be mindful that such postings may not be correct. If you have participated in false propaganda intentionally or unintentionally, the university may have to take disciplinary action.
  3. In social media, people could easily fabricate the truth when posting messages or photographs. Such persons may invite you to participate in a protest campaign using your personal identity and asking you to post contents/share messages or emails to both university officials and outside parties. We kindly advise you to be very mindful when you participate in such activities that can bring disrespect to your University.
  4. Every citizen has freedom of speech and expression. However, social media should not be used to attack organizations, groups, or individuals by posting hate speech, sharing critical or sensitive messages written by others, expressing opinions that will create suspicion or social unrest within the wider society. If you have contributed to or assisted in such activities using social media, you would face disciplinary action.
  5. It is very important not to disturb academic activities through social media by posting answers for questions or requesting unauthorized assistance from others while engaging in academic activities. For example, sharing answers to assignments/exam paper questions through social media is unacceptable. Such activities may lead to disciplinary action.
  6. Some may assume that it is ‘safe’ to engage in wrongful activities using a bogus identity/account and such a method will protect the actual person. Technology and tools are available to trace the real identity of such persons. Authorities could identify the person, the actual device, and physical location if and when necessary. Therefore, we strongly advise you not to engage in unauthorized or illegal activities using a bogus identity.
  7. If you publish digital contents as the University of Jaffna on social media using the University name, logo, or any other university intellectual property such as scanned books, past papers, etc., prior permission from the Registrar’s office is required. If you use the University of Jaffna Logo, you must follow the Logo guidelines.
  8. Your communications in social media must not include offensive or derogatory posts, blogs, images, videos, false rumours or comments relating to gender, ethnicity, race, nationality, disability, reassignment, sexual orientation, religious basis, or those that pose a threat to national security.
  9. You are advised to refrain from posting someone else’s images, videos, or any other digital contents without proper permission of the original content publisher. You should also not share any copyrighted material without proper approval from the respective publisher(s).
  10. It is important to recognize that online conduct is governed by the same laws, policies, and rules of conduct that applies to all day-to-day activities. The University of Jaffna urges students to be aware of the potential risks when making personal information public; to think about future implications and possible consequences of all posts, and to ensure safety through responsible and conscious decisions when using social media.
  11. It is your responsibility, to protect your social media accounts and for being aware of third-party applications that share your personal information to the public. If you need technical advice that protects your social media accounts, the university IT experts are available to help you.