Managing Google Groups

How do you get to Google Groups?

Google Groups is an app that is part of Swarthmore's Google Workspace. You can access it by clicking on the App Menu (or the icon made up of 9 squares) in the top-right corner of any other Google app such as Gmail or Drive and it will open up your apps menu where you will find the Google Groups icon.

This will take you to the home page for the Groups app. From here you will click on My Groups - either the link in the list on the left-hand side or the button [pictured below]. This will take you to a list of all of the groups you are a part of here at Swarthmore.

There may be groups on this list that you were added to as a member automatically, such as the Faculty-Staff list, and there are some that you may see a “Manage” link under the title. This means you are a Manager. You can click on this link and be immediately brought to the management page. If you are already on the group page (i.e. you clicked on the group name and you are already looking around) and you want to know how to get to the management page, you will see the link on the right-hand side of the page towards the top and just below the two gear buttons used for Group settings [pictured below].

You will only see the Manage link if you are a Manager. You will only see the Members link if you have permission to view the list of the group’s members. You will always see the About link.

How do you add Members?

Once you are on your group’s management page you will see a list of all of the members of your group with various information for each one - display name, their email address, their role, what their email delivery frequency is set to, the date they joined and what their posting permissions are (allowed, moderated, or not allowed). On the left-hand side will be several drop-down sections of permissions for the group - Members, Messages, Settings, Permissions, Roles, Information. The top section, Members, will already be open for you. In this section you will see two options for adding members to your group:

Invite Members

You can choose this option and each email address you add to this section before sending will get an invitation to join your group. They are NOT considered members, and will not receive emails from the group, until they actively accept the invitation.

Direct Add Members

You can directly add members to your group. You MUST include a message in the space provided in order to direct add members. This will automatically add all members you include into your group and they will start receiving emails from the group as soon as your direct add message goes out. This is only recommended when the intended members are already aware they are becoming part of a mailing list or group and are also members of your organization.

How do you remove members?

You can remove members from the main management page. Simply click on the checkbox next to the member’s name. Across the top of the page you will see an “Actions” button with a downward facing arrow. This button will allow you to do various things, but “Remove from group” and “Ban” are your two removal options. Banning is permanent and Google will ask you to report why you are banning that user, so use extreme caution with this option.

Other Helpful Member Actions

You can only access that “Actions” button on the management page, and only then when you have at least one box next to a member’s name checked. You can check off multiple boxes to make changes for multiple members at once if need as well. Below is a list of what some of the other options allow you to do in case you need them.

• Add to role - Allows you give someone more permissions than they had before - i.e. turn a Member into a Manager.

• Remove from role - Allows you to take a person out of a higher role and leave them as just a Member of the group.

• Remove from group and Ban are covered above

• Change delivery setting - Allows you to change how often the selected member receives email from the group. Members can change this on their own, which can often lead to them missing important group announcements. This allows you to actually reset their email delivery settings for the group.

• Set posting permission - You can change whether members are able to “post to” or email the group. You can leave it as the default group setting, or you can override this setting and choose to Allow, Disallow, or Moderate the selected users messages to the group.