Brief presentation by Nancy Bartlett
Brief presentation by Nancy Deromedi
Final Comments for Practicum Reports by Nancy Bartlett

You may recall that as a class we met much earlier this semester for a general discussion on appraisal of university records. I attempted in my presentation that day to do three things:

1. to review notions of informational value and evidential value;

2. to present a general and very brief history of appraisal both at the national level and more specifically at the University of Michigan from 1935 to the present (from its precustodial to custodial to postcustodial phases);

3. and to probe through a "case study" of the university’s College of Architecture and Urban Planning the genres, functions, and “values” of university records. Let me remind you briefly that the functions of university records, according to Helen Samuels, fall into the following categories:

1. confer credentials
   
2. convey knowledge
   
3. foster socialization
   
4. conduct research
   
5. sustain the institution
   
6. provide public service
   
7. promote culture
   

In that earlier meeting I also listed for you the so-called "research values" of archival records, according to author Maynard Brichford. These were

1. uniqueness
   
2. credibility
   
3. understandability
   
4. time span
   
5. accessibility
   
6. potential frequency, type, and quality of use
   

What I presented that day was neutral of medium. In other words, I did not attempt that day to delineate appraisal according to the vintage and medium of the information. But today, I’d like to resume very, very briefly that earlier discussion as my contribution to this effort to compare and contrast "legacy" data of our already established record group from the University of Michigan College of Architecture and Urban Planning with the college’s current website. I attempted to "grade" our relative successes for Helen Samuel’s functions. It seems that paper-based records already here at the Bentley document very well the conferring of credentials and sustaining the institution; fairly well fostering socialization; and not well at all the functions of conveying knowledge, conducting research, providing public service, and promoting the "culture" of the university.

One can easily examine the entire content of the college’s current website. It’s a fairly flat and static site, absent of much sophisticated design which is ironic for a college so obviously visual in its orientation. Access to the site is obvious (http:www.caup.umich.edu/) but authorship is much less so. The overall purpose of the site seems fairly clear: to introduce the college to potential students first and foremost and to provide information on course options and degree requirements to enrolled students. Information pertaining to the function of conferring of credentials seems clear and complete. The site aims to foster socialization, especially among alumni, a group much less documented in the record group here at the Bentley. Promoting the culture of the university seems also to be a successful aim and function of the site. Conducting research, sustaining the institution, and conveying knowledge are largely absent as functional attributes of the site. (Nor is this information obviously available elsewhere online within the larger University of Michigan web environment). The clearest gain in information is the attractive description of the environment for potential "clients" or students of the university. One reasonable expectation left unfulfilled is information on faculty research.
CV’s are skeletal and at least two years old. In the final analysis, this examination of the College of Architecture and Urban Planning has convinced me all the more that appraisal is

1. an exercise in comparison with past practice
   
2. an obligation to document decisions (through a tracking system, donor file, and finding aid)
   
3. an opportunity to observe and capture previously unavailable or newer types of information
   
4. a multi-pronged strategy, with blended record groups of print and digital media, in custody or shared stewardship, very much a part of our future
   

We will no doubt continue to receive paper-based records from the college on a very regular basis. It is one of the most active academic partners of the archives. The website, while unique in some of its outreach to prospective students and to alumni, is not highly critical to our successful documentation of the college. An annual snapshot of the site would suffice and would complement nicely the other transfers from the college.

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