At a meeting of the President and Fellows of Harvard College in Cambridge, March 13, 1995: voted to amend the Corporation's regulations, adopted February 6, 1939, providing for the preservation of records.
The purpose of the amendment is to authorize a comprehensive records management program throughout the University, under the direction of the University Archives. The objective of such a program shall be to ensure the prudent maintenance and efficient disposition of University records, consistent with sound archival standards, budgetary considerations, and legal obligations.
- University records evince the University's history, organization and operations; as such, they are the property of the University and not of the officers, faculty members, or employees who create them or to whom they are entrusted. The University's records, as defined in the subsequent note, consist of information assembled or kept in any medium, whether paper, tapes, computer disks, or other media.
- Records are not to be destroyed or otherwise disposed of except in accordance with procedures and schedules established by the University Archives through its records management program.
- The Curator of the University Archives shall establish general record procedures and retention schedules for records that are common to the University's various offices and departments, subject to approval by the Secretary to the Corporation and the Director of the University Library. The Office of the General Counsel shall be consulted when appropriate to ensure compliance with legal obligations.
- The Curator of the University Archives may establish special record procedures and retention schedules necessary to preserve exceptional records or to accommodate unusual circumstances. Such procedures and schedules shall be devised in consultation with the officer in charge of the affected records and, when appropriate, with the Secretary to the Corporation, the Director of the University Library, and the office of General Counsel.
- Faculties and other units may establish individual archives; in such cases the administrator of the archives shall coordinate the archives' procedures and schedules with the Curator of the University Archives to ensure that the objectives of the University's record management program are met. The administrator of the Archives shall observe archival standards and university policies regarding the condition of the records and the storage facility as well as the maintenance and accessibility of the collection. No records in these archives shall be destroyed without the approval of the Curator of the University Archives.
Note
University records definition
For the purposes of this definition, records shall mean recorded information, regardless of physical form.
University records include all forms of recorded information regardless of physical characteristics, created, received, recorded, or legally filed in the course of University business or in pursuance of the University's legal obligations. These records serve as evidence of the University's organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, operations, or other activities and are subject to records management review and evaluation prior to any decisions regarding reformatting or disposal. University records include but are not limited to minutes; correspondence; memoranda; financial records, such as invoices, journals, ledgers, purchase orders, and other information pertaining to fiscal matters, including grant fiscal matters; published materials, including reports and newsletters; moving images and photographs; sound recordings; drawings and maps; annotated copies or books; and computer data or other machine readable electronic records, including electronic mail. Records created or received by faculty in administrative and University committee capacities are also considered to be University records.
The items found in the following list are not considered University records. However, the Archives offers its services for selected disposition of those items found relevant to its collection policy:
- Extra copies of documents kept only for convenience or reference;
- Extra copies of publication stocked for distribution purposes;
- Reproduction masters, unless they are the only copy of the record in existence or are the microfilm master copy;
- Material relating to individual employees' memberships;
- Faculty research notes;
- Blank forms kept for supply purposes;
- Personal or private papers neither created not received in connection with the University's business; and
- Reference materials such as library, museum, and specimen material made or acquired solely for reference, research, or exhibition purposes.
Attest:
Secretary
Michael Barone
Barbara Graham
Harley Holden
Margaret Marshall
Allan Ryan, Jr.
Sidney Verba
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