Your UW Exchange Local account (mail and calendar, etc.) is provided through your department. The department pays a small monthly fee to maintain each account, and will want to delete your account as soon as possible after you leave the department.
Many UW departments use UW Exchange Local, but not all. You should ask the computing support team in your new department (ask your new manager) if "UW Exchange Local" is used in your new department. If so, let your new computing support folks know that you already have a UW Exchange Local account, but they should move support and charges for that account to your new department. This will prevent your old department from deleting the account and you can continue to use it without interruption.
If your new department does not use UW Exchange Local, you will have to discontinue use of the UW Exchange Local service. Ask the computing support team in your new department if there is a departmental preference on which email service you should be using.
Your UW email address (Your_UWNetID@uw.edu) is yours "forever". You can set up forwarding so mail sent to that address is delivered wherever you wish. If you officially retire, you may be eligible for a UW email service, other than UW Exchange. If you are separating from the UW, you may get an email account with your new employer, or choose to open an account privately.
You will want to take steps to exit UW Exchange before your last day with your current department. Some of these steps may take several days to finish, especially where you rely on others to take some actions. Your local/departmental computing support team should be able to provide assistance if needed.
To gracefully exit UW Exchange you should:
Note that email sent to your UW Email address from outside of UW
Exchange will now go to the mailbox you've named, but mail from other UW
Exchange users will still be going to your UW Exchange Inbox.
Note the "out of office" message will be delivered only to people that
actually get a message delivered to your UW Exchange mailbox.
This process can be greatly simplified if you have a copy of Microsoft
Outlook available on the computer(s) you'll be using. It then becomes: