Unless otherwise noted, most of these definitions were taken from the Society of American Archivists Dictionary of Archives Terminology and the Indiana University Bloomington University Archives Records Management Glossary of Terms. Some of the definitions were supplied by the UHCL Archives Associate Director and University Archivist from professional experience.
Active Records
- Records that continue to be used with sufficient frequency to justify keeping them in the office of creation; i.e. current records.
- “A record needed to perform current operations or ongoing business matters. It is consulted frequently, and it must be conveniently available for immediate reference, either manually or via a computer system” (Indiana University Bloomington University Archives Records Management Glossary of Terms)
Inactive Records
- Records that are no longer used in the day-to-day course of business, but which may be preserved and occasionally used for legal, historical, or operational purposes.
- “A record no longer needed to conduct current business but preserved until it meets the end of its retention period.” (Indiana University Bloomington University Archives Records Management Glossary of Terms)
Vital Records
- Those records that are essential to resume business or continue the university’s operations; the records necessary to recreate the university’s financial or legal position, or to preserve the rights of the university, employees or students.
Permanent Record
- A record that has been determined to have sufficient historical, administrative, legal, fiscal, or other value to warrant continuing preservation. (Indiana University Bloomington University Archives Records Management Glossary of Terms)
Record Copy
- The copy of a record designated to satisfy an organization’s retention requirements for information that exists in multiple copies; also known as the official copy.
- Multiple offices or individuals of an institution can have original copies of the same records. They should maintain those records until an archives professional has a chance to review them, or they are slated for destruction per the retention schedule whether they should be kept or not.
Convenience Copies (also called Duplicate or Working or Reference copy)
- Duplicate(s) of an original record, often used for access or reference.
- Records where the original documents exist in another area or are in the possession of another department and includes such records as voucher copies, monthly automated budget reports and similar.
Retention Schedule
- A document that identifies and describes an organization’s records, usually at the series level, provides instructions for the disposition of records throughout their life cycle.
Functional Retention Schedule
- UHS Records Retention Schedule is a functional schedule—meaning the schedule is organized in record series based on the record’s function, not on the structure of the organizational entity that owns or manages it.
- There are not lists of specific records to be kept by a specific office, for example.
- Unit has to look at what their records are, and where they fit within the retention schedule.
