As a means of enhancing communication, students receive an UH email alias to be used for all official electronic correspondence. The email alias is a pointer that directs email messages to a destination email account. Per the UH student email policy, the University uses the UH email alias to send important information such as emergency closings or any official information.  Current students, staff and faculty are eligible to receive an email exchange account, if they currently do not already have one.  Students must ensure that the UH email alias points to a working email address at all times. Students may update their email address information by logging on to AccessUH and going to myUH. 

• Check and Update Destinations for UH Email Aliases
• Naming Convention for Email Aliases
• Exchange/CougarNet email
• Name Changes
• Faculty Needing to Send a Message to Students

How to Check and Update Destinations for UH Email Alias:

• Students
• Faculty and Staff

Naming Convention for Email Aliases

UH-style email addresses are created automatically according to the name obtained from UH's official employee or student records. The standard naming convention is:

first-initial + last-name@uh.edu
or 
first-initial + middle-initial + last-name@uh.edu

If an alias is already in use, it will be necessary to add a number to the end of the last name to make it unique. Examples of this naming convention are jcougar@uh.edu, jacougar@uh.edu, and jcougar3@uh.edu.

Exchange/CougarNet Email

Current students, faculty and staff also receive an Exchange/CougarNet email account. The Exchange mail server can be accessed via Outlook, which provides a single location for organizing and managing day-to-day information, from email and calendars to contacts and task lists.

The email can also be accessed using a web browser, such as Internet Explorer, Chrome, Safari and Firefox.

To access your Exchange/CougarNet email online, login into your Microsoft 365 account: 

• Log into AccessUH , click the Microsoft 365 icon and follow the link
• Log into Microsoft 365 
• Enter your UserID:  ex: CougarNetID@cougarnet.uh.edu
• Enter your CougarNet password

Name Changes

Sometimes names change. Email addresses can be updated, if necessary, to reflect name changes. To request a name change, complete the Account Rename Form.  Address ownership will be verified using your Cougar Card. Names must be changed in the official University records before the email addresses can be updated.

Faculty Needing to Send a Message to Students

Faculty have a few options available to send messages to their students:

1. Using myUH Class Rosters in the Faculty Center (links to a PDF)
2. Using Canvas

The Office of Faculty Design and Instructional Support (FDIS) has collected more information about communicating with students at the Instructional Continuity Checklist website.