Thursday, October 1, 2026
The Rockville Centre School District is taking another step into the 21st century.
Christopher Pellettieri, the district’s assistant superintendent for curriculum, announced at the Board of Education meeting last week that students would soon be receiving school district email addresses.
“We are able to provide our students in grades 5 through 12 with Rockville Centre student email accounts,” said Pellettieri.
The email accounts would be usable by students to communicate with one another and their teachers, Pellettieri said. They will only be able to send and receive emails from other RVC schools email accounts.
“It’s going to be our own universe,” Pellettieri said. “They can’t email to anyone outside of our little universe, and no one outside our universe can email in. We want to have as many safeguards as we can at first.”
The emails will use student names. For example, John Smith’s email address would be jsmith.student@rvcschools.org.
Students would be able to access their email from any computer or Internet-enabled device, including iPads. The iPad program in the middle school was one of the reasons the district decided to give students emails. “One of the shortcomings of the iPads is that kids would create projects, collaborate on the iPads and then not be able to get any information off the iPads because they didn’t have email accounts, and we didn’t want kids using personal email accounts,” said Pellettieri.
Students would be able to email each other and their teachers. Principals could also send emails to the students. And it’s possible that coaches or club advisors could send email notifications to the students on their rosters.
The email accounts, however, would not be private. Parents are encouraged to learn what their child’s password is. And the accounts would be accessible to district personnel at any time. Though they won’t be actively monitoring all emails, they would have the ability to access any student’s account should the need arise. Pellettieri also explained that, under state law, the district will be archiving the emails for five years or more.
The email addresses come as the district is planning to expand its iPad program. Currently, all fifth graders have iPads. By December, the district plans to put them in the hands of sixth and seventh graders as well. All students should have email addresses before then.
“I know, to some people, this isn’t a big deal at all,” Pellettieri said. “To create a place where we know we can go and keep an eye on and protect our students and share safely, I think is a great thing.”
