In February 2021, Google announced a new storage policy ending free unlimited storage for the academic community, effective July 1, 2022.

VCCCD will begin enforcing a 15GB storage limit as of August 11, 2023.

Google has decided to change its storage policy after considering the vast amount of data uploaded to cloud storage daily.

Excerpt from Google, Inc’s official statement regarding the new storage policy:

“Google has traditionally offered unlimited storage to qualifying schools and universities for free. However, as we’ve [Google] grown to serve more schools and universities each year, storage consumption has also rapidly accelerated. Storage is not being consumed equitably across — nor within — institutions, and school leaders often don't have the tools they need to manage this. To support schools into the future and ensure fair distribution of this valuable resource, we [Google] will be implementing a new pooled storage model and helping admins and school leaders manage their storage. Nothing is changing today and we expect that more than 99% of institutions will be within the pooled storage provided by the new policy.” Source: Google, Inc.

Refer to Google’s complete announcement.

Although storage used by students  is in-scope for this change in Google’s storage policy, sufficient storage is available for educational purposes without incurring extra costs to VCCCD at this time. Follow storage and usage best practices and only store data for college use - remove unnecessary files stored under your my.vcccd account.

Schools and universities have a baseline of 100TB of pooled storage shared across users and accounts. Institutions with more than 20,000 students, faculty, and staff, or 20,000 monthly-active users that follow Google’s Acceptable Use Policy, receive an additional storage allocation in addition to the 100TB baseline.

Source: Google, Inc

If VCCCD exceeds Google’s 100TB plus additional allocation baseline of storage beyond Google’s deadline of July 1, 2022, Google will begin charging for those overages - an unplanned, additional expense.

Any “pooled storage” data stored in your my.vcccd Google account is impacted. Pooled storage is a shared resource for all VCCCD students for everything in their accounts and shared drives.

Your storage amount includes Gmail, Google Drive (examples - documents, sheets, slides, forms, etc.), Google Shared Drives, and Google Photos.

Visit the Google Drive Storage page to see how much storage you’re using.

The total amount of storage you use in Google includes, but is not limited to, files from Google Drive, Gmail, Google Shared Drives, and Google Photos.

Google Drive (My Drive)

• Most files in your My Drive. For example:
  • PDFs
  • Images
  • Videos Meet call recordings
• Items in your Trash. Learn how to empty your trash. Note that deleted files are removed automatically after 30 days. Deleted files are unrecoverable in most cases.

Google Shared Drive

• Most files in your Shared Drive. For example:
  • PDFs
  • Images
  • Videos
  • Meet call recordings
• Items in your Trash. Learn how to empty your trash. Note that deleted files are removed automatically after 30 days. Deleted files are unrecoverable in most cases.

Gmail

• Messages and attachments, like items in your Spam and Trash folders. Note that deleted files in Trash are removed automatically after 30 days. Deleted files are unrecoverable in most cases.

Google Photos

• Photos and videos backed up in original quality.

Note: Deleted messages and files retained by Google Vault don’t count against the user’s storage quota or the total pooled storage of your Google Workspace domain.

Source: Google, Inc.

Content in shared drives counts toward VCCCD’s storage baseline (cap).

According to Google, individual users can only upload 750GB each day between My Drive and all shared drives. Users who reach the 750GB limit or upload a file larger than 750GB cannot upload additional files that day. Uploads that are in progress will complete. The maximum individual file size that you can upload or synchronize is 5TB.

Source: Google, Inc.

Yes. To search for and delete unnecessary or large emails or other large files, use these Google instructions to manage files in your Google Drive storage.

Refer to these links to Google-recommended tools and techniques for more information.

• Delete files by size in Google Drive
• Permanently delete large emails in Gmail
• Permanently delete emails in your Spam folder
• Move photos & videos to Trash
• Delete and recover files using Google One Storage Manager
• Remove hidden data from apps in Google Drive

Source: Google, Inc.

Several different data types may consume large amounts of Google Workspace for Education storage space.

Refer to the following information from Google to learn more.

• Google Drive
• Gmail
• Google Photos
• Storage Differences in Google Drive

Source: Google, Inc.

In some instances, yes. Refer to the following information from Google to learn more about file types and how Google’s storage policies may apply.

• Particular kinds of files in Google Drive
• Particular types of files in Google Photos

Source: Google, Inc.

Yes, there are quick wins we can suggest to help.

For example, in email or Google Drive search fields, look for files ending in .iso, .mp4, .mov, and .wav to find significant storage utilization.

Other recommendations

• To perform a bulk deletion in email, select the square at the far left to “select all” and then choose the option below to select all conversations that match this search and select “delete” from the trash can item above. You will be asked to “Confirm Bulk Action” and choose OK.
• Empty the trash to free up space. Hint: Refer to Google’s instructions for assistance in deleting. Note that deleted files are removed automatically after 30 days. Deleted filed are unrecoverable in most cases.