Hi there - while I've been lurking on this list for some time I
understand the custom is to introduce myself on my first post - I serve
as the University Archivist and Head of Special Collections at ASU but
have also coordinated our campus records management program since 1996
(and assisted with inquiries since 1989). I've enjoyed the expertise of
this group immensely.

On policy manuals, we scheduled all university policy manuals as
permanent records back in 1998 with the support of our General Counsel
and our Provost. However the thing that made this interesting was the
fact these were put online with the goal of real-time updating. This
presents a problem in terms of managing version control since the
version of the policy in force at the time of the litigious incident is
needed to defend the institution. As a result there's a need to manage
the updating of policies so snapshots can be preserved, but the
university is not always in control of the implementation date of new
policies.

To address this we established a 3x/year cycle for policy updates so
that the vast majority of updates are posted at a specific time and a
complete snapshot of the entire policy manual is made and stored after
posting. When a policy must be posted immediately (e.g. in response to
legislation) policies can be posted right away, but a snapshot of the
new out of cycle policy must be taken right away as well. The university
office that publishes policies also creates "Manual Revision Notices"
online to track the changed policies, and these are preserved as well.

We respond to General Counsel requests for access to superseded policies
several times per year. The vast majority of these requests are for
personnel or academic affairs policies (re: tenure and promotion). I
recently provided policy info to counsel from our 1975 faculty handbook
(paper of course)....

Rob Spindler
University Archivist and Head
Archives and Special Collections
Arizona State University Libraries
Tempe AZ 85287-1006
480.965.9277
http://www.asu.edu/lib/archives 

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