INTRODUCTION

Although it is our desire and professional inclination to “fully process” all collections, reality is such that it is an impossible undertaking. Archivists must make decisions about how much physical and intellectual control collections need on a case by case (or collection by collection) basis. This document outlines five different levels of physical and intellectual control that an archivist can assign to incoming, or previously accessioned, collections and accessions. This document explains in detail the amount of physical and intellectual control expected at each level.

IASC was an early adopter of More Product Less Process (MPLP) and strives to make collections accessible to all researchers as quickly as possible. Employing MPLP means that all collections are expected to have a basic level of access. To do this, archivists must make decisions about the appraisal and arrangement of collections before processing. Our goal with this document is to make clear the professional skill involved in MPLP-style processing and to create criteria for different processing levels. Each collection requires advanced decision making skills on the part of archivists to determine its immediate appraisal, arrangement, and description needs. It is up to the archivist to determine the level of processing a collection warrants either upon accessioning, or at a later date, and then to create a work plan for that collection. Archives Assistants are charged with creating folder level inventories and carrying out specific tasks from the work plan.

As working with collections is an iterative process, collections that begin at a Processing Level 1 may later be processed up to a Level 5, depending on resources and user interest. There are a number of factors to take into consideration when determining the processing level. Researcher interest, related collections, the size of the collection, the amount of free space we have on site, special funding, donor expectations, staff availability, and MIT and federal restrictions, are all important factors to keep in mind when creating a work plan and processing level for a collection.

Material is added to the IASC with the intent that it will be made available to the public. Collections processed at Level 1 can be used for research. Because of this, it is important that we screen [LINK] or make note of sensitive material while processing a collection at the 1 and 2 levels whenever possible.

Collections that have reached a level 2 of processing may be ready to be published on the IASC website. It is important to keep in mind that even if a collection is not published to our website it will be used for IASC internal staff to answer researcher queries, or be made accessible to researchers who request it.