The University is always changing and evolving, and so are we. Throughout the years, our methods, services, schedules and website have changed, and especially now following the survey feedback we are striving to implement improvements to records management across the University.
Somethings that have changed recently is the Retention and Disposition Schedules (RDS). The 2022 schedules changed in both content and display, and some people commented in the survey feedback that they needed to spend more time understanding the layout and content. Therefore, we decided to write this post on how to read a Records Retention and Disposition Schedule. The Schedules can be accessed on the Retention Schedules tab of our website. We have annotated schedule RA5650: Research Administration – Research Grants, Awards, and Honorifics and we will be going through it below.
Records schedules are based on a hierarchy. A Primary is typically associated with a function— in this case, Research Grants, Awards and Honorifics— that breaks down at the lower levels into either subjects or activities, these are called Secondaries.
The schedule number is unique to each primary and it is comprised of the sector code (in this case, RA for Research Administration) and the actual number (in this case, 5650). Next, we have the primary title, which is the title for this schedule, Research Grants, Awards, and Honorifics. Last but not least, in this first section is the Office of Primary Responsibility (OPR). The OPR documents what unit is responsible for creating, keeping and preserving the full and complete set of records. It will always be found in the top right corner of the schedule, and it differs between schedules. In this case, the units responsible for creating, keeping and maintaining these records are the offices where they were created. In other words, each office has the duty to care for their produced material related to Research Grants, Awards and Honorifics. More details below.
The description explains more records more in-depth and includes examples such as agendas, minutes, lists of applicants/projects, etc. When expanding the More Details drop-down menu, there are several new items that show up. Vital records are records that contain information essential to conduct emergency operations and re-establish rights and/or UBC services. PIB refers to the Personal Information Bank. The PIB has to be made available in compliance with FIPPA Part 6: General Provisions, and it refers to a “collection of personal information that is organized or retrievable by the name of an individual or by an identifying number, symbol or other particular assigned to an individual” (according to the Government of Canada’s Records Management Glossary).
The Authority is what determined the rules and guidelines we see in this Schedule, in this instance, the Board of Governor’s (BoG) Policies LR1 Honourifics Policy and LR5 Research Grants Policy. Lastly, the date in which this Retention Schedule was approved, in the format YYYYMMDD. This might also include sometimes more dates as the Schedules are updated and revised.
The secondaries are most likely what will be consulted often because this is where we can imagine the records aggregating. The description gives us examples of the types of records that fall in this Schedule, but now we are told what to do with those records under the heading: Retention, Destruction & Disposition. The Retention Schedules will tell us how long to retain the series and what to do with the records when they are no longer needed.
For example, we know that committee meeting minutes related to Research Grants policies are kept in this schedule. As can be seen above, policies and procedures are number RA5650-01, are retained for EV+5Y, FR. What that means is that they start their retention period when they become superseded or obsolete (EV=Date record is superseded or obsolete), are kept for an additional five years, and then they go to the University Archives for Full Retention (FR). Polices are an important record. Event triggers can be different for each item, and there will always be a subtitle detailing what each specific entry of EV means.
At the bottom of the page there’s an Acronym Key which describes what each acronym means, however, you can also hover over the dotted acronyms for a quick reference (as can be shown below).
The cursor hovers over the EV and the black reference bubble appears for easier consult of the Acronym Key.
We hope this guide is helpful in reading the Retention and Disposition Schedules. If you encounter any problems, please contact us.
Further reading:
The Retention Schedules page on our website not only holds all RDS, but it’s also where you can find the unit-level Model File Plan for units to adapt to their needs, and the Transitory Records Schedule, which is the focus of one of our next blog posts.
The Policies, Guidelines, Best Practices and Standards page has further resources and information on Records Management.