All students, faculty and staff can update preferred personal data

University of South Carolina students, faculty and staff can add a preferred first or last name, or select personal pronouns in their information beginning Tuesday, June 1.

As part of the university’s ongoing efforts to promote a more inclusive campus environment, individuals at all campuses can update preferred personal data by logging into myaccount.sc.edu.

• Students’ preferred names and personal pronouns will appear only in Office 365, portions of the university student and employee directory and email alias system. In the future, this information will be available in Banner, PeopleSoft and Blackboard.
• Students and employees may now select personal pronouns from a drop-down menu. Pronoun options include she/her/hers; he/him/his; they/them/theirs; ze/zir/zirs and others.
• Only those individuals who want their preferred names and pronouns available to all students and employees should enter this information. Otherwise, these field should be left blank.

Users also can change their display name in Office 365 (including Outlook and Teams, among other programs). Individuals can change the current default in Office 365 that displays names in all caps to include lowercase letters.

• Preferred names can only be changed once every 365 days
• Legal name changes must first be submitted to Office of the University Registrar for students or Human Resources for university employees.

Students, faculty and staff will be able to change their email alias to include parts of their preferred first or last name. 

• Note – an individual can only have one email alias. If a previous alias was created, it will be replaced with the new one. Any email sent to the previous alias WILL NOT be delivered.

For additional help and assistance with myaccount.sc.edu, please contact the IT Service Desk at or 803-777-1800.

Additional information and resources for supporting the LGBTQ+ community at UofSC can be found in the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs.