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Re: C&U archives authority



Our archives have been in existence for a little over twenty years
with no formal collecting policy - the previous archivists were
basically hunter-gatherers and collected what they could and did a
good job!  Unfortunately, being trained librarians, they created a
library-type classification system for the collections - records
were organised according to subject and not origin - groups were
split up, creating tremendous problems.  A lot of ephemeral material
were also collected and the scope of our collections are still
somewhat limited. But there's hope!  I started at Wits two years ago
and finally seem to be getting somewhere - new access to information
legislation in South Africa, also applicable to universities, have
got the management running and finally willing to accept the
necessity for formal policies on archives administration, records
management and access to information (all of which I'm frantically
working on!).  Still a long way to go in terms of adequate resources,
but finally we'll have the required authority and can take it from
there.  New policies and programmes will be posted on our website
(very basic at the moment!) as they are approved - please visit our
site for updates & I'd be happy to have regular e-mail discussions
with other university archivists just starting out on a formalised
archival & records management programme.


Marius Coetzee
University Archivist & Records Manager
E-mail:  160maco@atlas.wits.ac.za
URL:     http://www.wits.ac.za/cro/index.htm

Central Records Office
University of the Witwatersrand
Private Bag 3
Wits 2050
South Africa
Tel:  +27 (0)11 717 1251
Fax:  +27 (0)11 717 1229

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