Baruch’s email system has recently been updated, and the student population has mixed reviews about the changeover.

The old interface was based on a simplistic, bare bones Hotmail platform and the new format on the sleek frame format of Outlook, Microsoft’s host suite of email and collaboration tools, which is known best for its in-class modern features.

Despite this change, some students, such as Travis James, claim that it was unsuccessful and unnoticeable.

“I don’t feel it’s upgraded, but serves its purpose for a college email,” said James, who was familiar with the email provider that Baruch is currently dealing with and talked about them briefly before changing the subject to Gmail.

This provider informed the college a few weeks ago that they were planning on upgrading our email system, and performing a few intended changes. As of Thursday, March 27, Microsoft informed Baruch College that the migration was complete and students now have access to the new Microsoft Outlook Life email system.

Out of the many students interviewed by The Ticker about the email changeover, all but two were unenthusiastic.

“Let’s just put it this way,” said John Donnelly. “I don’t like it…contacts don’t load, and I don’t understand why none of my contacts are saved like they used to be. Now when I try to send an email I have to retrieve those email addresses, which is such a pain!”

Leah Sutherland thinks that the program, despite its intended image and utility, is still a bit too chunky.

“I don’t like how a new window opens in order to create a new message,” she said. “It’s too much to navigate especially when I’m at school and already have multiple windows open with other stuff. I found it to be really cluttered.”

One question that arose was: Are you a PC (aka Microsoft type) or are you a Mac?  IPhone-toting students were bothered by the lack of clear notice that anything would be different when the new system came into effect.

A complaint from several students about trying to configure their account with an iPhone was that they didn’t realize they were supposed to delete their existing Baruch email from their iPhone and then re-enter the IMAP Account information and the Incoming Mail Server Host Name in order for it to normally function.

There was a general sentiment among the student population questioned in passing on the topic that this information should have been made more available to them, claiming the lack of communication to be a nuisance and in the end, very time consuming, something that students could ill afford as this migration took place in conjunction with mid-terms.

Sara Faber says, “They didn’t notify us that we weren’t going to be able to receive emails once this upgrade was complete. This really annoyed me because when I realized I wasn’t getting emails through my iPhone I decided to check my emails on my computer and noticed I had ten unopened messages!”

The two students interviewed by The Ticker who felt the new upgrade was helpful, Karen Baruch and Melissa Colas, both argued that the upgrade allowed them to arrange their emails in a more systematic fashion.

Karen Baruch said, “I really like the new Microsoft Outlook program. It’s very user friendly and I love the new feature that categorizes my mail by the day. It’s also clean and easy to adjust to. I definitely enjoy the improvements made on this platform, it’s very helpful!”

Melissa Colas said, “The new Outlook is more business oriented, organized and also sophisticated,” something sure to be appreciated by many of the business students in the population.

Love it or hate it, Outlook Life is something Baruch students will have to get used to. That is, unless someone has a better idea.