Wednesday, February 20, 2019

Records Management at Minnesota State University, Mankato: University Records Center Destruction

This is the third and final installment of a three part series about Records Management at Minnesota State University, Mankato.  Read more about transfers and retrievals in previous installments.

Once a year, the University Archives organizes the destruction of 200 to 400 boxes of campus materials stored temporarily in the University Records Center.  How do we know which boxes to destroy?  Well the date of destruction is determined by the transferring department at the time of transfer according to the campus Records Retention Schedules.

Hold up?!  Are you saying that the University Archives just destroys my materials at some point in time without my knowledge?  No, no, no.  Never fear, we're a little more methodical than that.  Each November, the University Archives generates University Records Center Certificates of Destruction for each department that owns materials slated for destruction that year.  We will not destroy any records without a signed University Records Center Certificate of Destruction returned to our office.

And we're flexible too.  If a department determines that some or all of the boxes slated for destruction need to be stored longer, we can do that too.  All the department needs to do is make those changes to the University Records Center Certificate of Destruction and return it to our office and we'll make the necessary changes.  Easy peasy!

When the University Archives receives all of the completed Certificates of Destruction, the Archives staff spring into action preparing for our big shredding day that usually occurs in early January (Brr!).  What do we do to prepare you ask?

  • Contact campus Facilities Services to schedule the campus contracted shredding services.  Yes, the shredding truck comes to us!
  • Organize staffing for the staging and shredding days.  Yep, they happen on different days.  It's too easy to make a mistake in the whirlwind of shredding day.
  • Stage all boxes slated for destruction.  This usually occurs the week after fall semester and may take a day or two to complete depending on the number of boxes.
Boxes staged for destruction, December 2018.
On the big day, the team assembles in the University Records Center.  We dump the materials into large wheeled recycle bins and roll them up to the Taylor Center loading dock.  Whew--heavy I know!  Usually within a couple of hours, the shredding is complete...for another year.
University Archives Technician Adam Smith

Feel free to contact us at archives@mnsu.edu or 507-389-1964 for all of your Records Management questions.

Anne Stenzel is an Archives Technician specializing in digitization at Minnesota State University, Mankato. She looks forward to your Records Management questions and comments below!

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