A1400 Records Retention Policy

Policy Summary

In general, College records will include any document, device or item, created, or received which serves to document the organization, functions, policies, decisions or other activities of the College and its faculty and staff. This will include such records as: correspondence, reports, policy statements, and related items, sent and received.

• Minutes of all College Board, College Council, committees and other groups.
• Printed or other reproduced items issued by the College.
• Sound or video recordings or photographs of College administrators, faculty, staff, groups or events.
• Personnel records of faculty, administrators, staff, students and alumni.
• Administrative records such as requisitions, purchase orders, invoices, cancelled checks, bank statements, ledgers, etc.
• Records recorded on magnetic devices or other mechanical devices.

This policy will be used by College administrators, faculty, and staff in the management of the records of the College. It will specify the records that will be kept, indicate their location and person responsible, and tell when and how they are to be destroyed.

The following criteria for determining status of records will be used for determining record retentions:

• Active Records – Records which are used by office personnel at least once each month.
• Inactive Records – Records which are used less than once each month.
• Obsolete Records – Records which are inactive and are not of sufficient value to warrant their transfer to the College Archives and are eligible for disposal.
• Archival Records – Records which are of sufficient research or display value to warrant their being preserved in the College Archives. These records are usually transferred to the Archives when they become inactive; if it is an item published by the College (bulletins, brochures, reports) one copy should be deposited in the Archives immediately upon publication.
• Record Series – Groups of related records which are normally filed and used as a unit and may be considered as such for disposition purposes.
• Essential Records – Records which are vital to the operations of the College and require maximum protection from theft or destruction. These records should have multiple copies which are housed in separate areas of the campus or be microfilmed or placed on data processing storage and be stored under maximum security conditions.

Record Retention Schedule

This schedule contains a list of various records retained by the College with an indication of how long the records should be maintained.

The schedule is not to be considered a static document but will be changing as new records come about and as old records become obsolete. Items not included in the schedule cannot be assumed to be items that can be discarded. These should be reviewed for addition to the schedule if appropriate.

Screening Records Prior to Destruction

Some items listed in the schedule provide that the records should be reviewed prior to destruction, removing and destroying those papers that do not have continuing value. This screening should be done by the administrator over the office involved. The records that contain the highest percentage of temporary material are correspondence and subject files, which are found at all levels of the College. The following categories of papers generally may be eliminated from correspondence files without affecting the substantive value of the files:

1. Letters and memorandums of transmittal that do nothing more than forward an enclosure and add nothing to the content of the item transmitted.
2. Acknowledgements.
3. Requests for information and publications which have been received or sent.
4. Reservations and confirmations.
5. Itineraries.
6. Requests to be added to mailing lists.
7. Invitations and announcements of meetings.
8. Materials that do not relate to the function or administration of the office.

How Records are to be Destroyed

Records under jurisdiction of Local Records Commission must be approved for destruction by that office, and the record retention schedules included in this policy must be observed for all other records. Records to be destroyed may be burned, buried or sold as waste paper. Records of confidential matter should be burned or shredded and buried.