Surveying

The first step in the process of providing access to a collection is to survey the collection and gather background information about it. A survey is a broad look at a set of materials, collecting both physical and intellectual attributes of the materials to aid in the planning of processing activities.

Physical accessions

If any description from a donor, creator, or curator accompanied the accession, begin by reviewing the provided description. For accessions that are accompanied by a box or folder inventory, compare the inventory to the contents of each box to verify the inventory's accuracy. 

For physical accessions that are not accompanied by an accurate inventory, or for any accessions that may need extra attention (due to possible access restrictions, preservation needs, etc.), use the survey template to take notes about each box. You want to get a broad overview of the accession, and in some cases may only spend 5-10 minutes per box, but never more than one hour per box. You do not need to, and should not look in, every folder at this point, nor should you begin sorting or arranging materials. Assign the boxes temporary box numbers using Post-it notes, or write on the boxes themselves in pencil. These box numbers may change later with rehousing, but this will help you locate materials as you begin processing. Record the following information using the survey template:

• Box number 
• Box size (paige, transfile, etc.)
• Box label included by donor(s), if applicable (written on or taped to boxes)
• Brief description of the contents of the box (correspondence with colleagues, memos and other materials from service on MIT committees, etc.)
• Date ranges
• Formats, including legacy digital media (floppy disks, CDs/DVDs, etc.), analog audio and video (VHS, audiocassettes, etc.), photographic material (prints, slides, etc.), or anything that is oversize or odd size
• Potential weeding/separations 
• Potential access restrictions
• Preservation issues (water damage, especially brittle material, etc.)

Some other things to take note of as you survey a physical accession:

• If the accession was accompanied by an accurate inventory, could we turn it into a container list in ArchivesSpace with minimal editing? Or would the description from your survey be sufficient for this accession?
• What is the total size of the accession? (make sure the original extent noted in the accession record is accurate)

• Are the boxes that the accession arrived in useable, or will the materials need to be transferred to new archival boxes? Are there Pendaflex/hanging folders? Is a lot of material not foldered at all? Do the folders generally have labels? (It is more likely that collections from organizations and offices will be better organized, foldered, and labeled than personal archives.)

• If appropriate for the collection, can you identify groupings of materials that could become series?

After you have completed your survey, send it to the Archival Processing Manager. Update the accession record.to include additional information about the description of content and dates.

Digital accessions

For readily accessible digital material, a donor will most likely not include a transfer inventory. Fortunately, it is fairly simple to get a listing of all the filenames included in an accession. If the Exactly tool was used to transfer the files, there will be a manifest file in the top level of the bag that will list all the files and where they fall in the folder structure. Additionally, if a CCA tool was used, either to transfer or to extract disk images, it would have produced a file list or file tree that you can use to get a sense of the materials. This is found in the submissionDocumentation folder produced in the package where you will see a "tree.txt" file that lists the directories and files in a hierarchical view. You can also go through your computer’s file browser and look at the folder structure, but this may take a long time and is not recommended beyond the upper level folders.

For accessions transferred with CCA tools, in the "brunnhilde" folder within the submissionDocumentation folder, there will be a file called "report.html" that will give you an overview of the date range of the files, file format types, and duplicates which may also be useful in understanding content. Make note of unusual formats not covered in the Archivematica format policy registry or that are marked as unidentified. As with physical accessions, take note of whether materials seem to be in any type of original order.