FACULTY OF INFORMATION MANAGEMENT

UNIVERSITI TEKNOLOGI MARA CAWANGAN JOHOR, KAMPUS

SEGAMAT

DIPLOMA IN INFORMATION MANAGEMENT (IM110)

FOUNDATION OF ARCHIVES ADMINISTRATION (IMD313)

ARTICLE REVIEW:

THE NEGLECTED FOND IN UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES: THE CASE OF

SPORT CLUB RECORDS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF KWAZULU-NATAL
(UKZN), PIETERMARITZBURG CAMPUS, SOUTH AFRICA

PREPARED BY:

HANIS AMIRA BINTI ISMAIL (2019238222)

CLASS: JIM1105A

PREPARED FOR:

MADAM SITI NOORSIAH BINTI JAMALUDIN

Introduction

At the university, each student has a student record that contains assessments of academic
performance, involvement in social, political, intellectual, and recreational activities. The
records differ according to each of their movements, which are academic and their involvement
in non-academic activities. This means that whatever matters relating to the student, the
information must be recorded in the student’s record. Student record preserve the history of the
university and society as a whole. These are useful resources for historical, genealogical, and
other forms of research. With student record, researchers can find out how academically these
students are, whether they are active in engaging in university-organized programs, and so on.
A sport club is defined as a group of students who voluntarily gather to pursue their common
interest in sports through participation and competition. sport clubs can control students’
emotions because when students become members of sport clubs, they have a lot of sports
activities organized and by playing sports they can temporarily forget their stress. the archival
collection is the major source documents representing sport clubs that document each
university's rich athletic history from its birth to the present. However, there are some sports
clubs that record material unmanaged and do not put file names explicitly. This is the main
problem of the university archive in University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), Pietermaritzburg
(PMB) Campus, South Africa.

Body (5 Issues or Important Points from Article)

1. University archive of University of Kwazulu-Natal (UKZN) faces the challenge of

finding sport club records.
This is because the archivist does not keep these records systematically and also does
not follow the proper record keeping rules. In addition, this problem also occurs because
most records from sport club are temporary records that do not have a long period to
keep them. When many sport club records are only temporary, many are disposed of
and it becomes a problem when the responsible person wants to retrieve sport club
records but the records that being kept in university archive are not many and not being
kept properly. This problem occurs because it is the voluntary group that manages the
records belonging to the student body. They are not archivists who can manage and
keep records. This should, should not happen but the university archive in UKZN is not
a university archive that cares about the care of these records. Moreover, the records

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 are not organized systematically because this university archive does not have a
designated office space to place their records.

2. University archive in UKZN does not keep student records and only research about the
faculties available in UKZN and schools located in PMB Campus.
This is because, the university archive overlooks records documenting the lives of
students at the university apart from their academic achievements. The student records
contain about the life that the student faces while studying at UKZN and extracurricular
activities. With student records, we can find out what challenges and difficulties he or
she faces. Their lives as a student will be memories and if the university archive has
student records, they can look back at the records when they have become alumni.
Unfortunately, student records are not stored by the university archive in UKZN. These
student records for research needs of various aspects of administrators, alumni, and the
community other than for student scholarships. However, due to the transient nature of
any student body, one of the challenges of collecting student organisation records and
other documents concerning students' extracurricular activities was the transitory nature
of any student body. This is because, each student only studies for a period of four years,
and during that period the record related to the student is a temporary record and is very
easy to discard. With this, we can know that student records are very important to the
student, because the record can be used as evidence that he studied here. In addition,
juniors can make these senior record students as a motivator to participate in
extracurricular activities in addition to their academic success. Hence, student records
are very important to keep even if they have graduated from UKZN as these records
can remind them of their life as a student at UKZN.

3. This article discusses how sport clubs in UKZN, PMB Campus manage their records
from creation of records to disposition of records.
After reviewing and conducting interviews, the study found that seven of the twelve
sports clubs did not transfer non-current records to sports unions or university archive,
eight suffered record loss, and eight maintained registers of all records generated or
received at their clubs. This was because the secretary of each sport club did not carry
out their responsibilities. They should keep minutes and other records relating to their
club in a steel locker at the records union office. There is a gap in the collections
collected by the university archive because sport clubs do not provide their records to

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 the university archive. This situation should not happen because many sport clubs hold
competitions and minutes of meetings. When sport clubs do not send records to the
university archive, the university archive does not have records that are often required
by researchers who are interested in activities held by sport clubs at this university such
as photos of competing teams, competition results, personal records from previous
members, articles a newspaper containing information about a sport club or competition
being held. These materials are important as it will contribute greatly to the historical
heritage of this university. Previously, there was a student newspaper published by the
university, NUX. NUX contains information related to this university, student
information, clubs available in this university and competitions held at this university.
Much information on sport clubs is contained in this newspaper. However, the
newspaper ceased publication in 1997. This is a major factor in the lack of sport clubs
record in the university archive. When this investigation was done, the archivist and
head of the sports administration had admitted that there was a wide gap related to the
sport club records kept in the university archive compared to other club records. Despite
the fact that there aren't many records of sport clubs in the university archive, these 12
clubs declare they have competitions and equipment records, and 8 confirm that images
and films are key collections in their archives. This record is not collected in the archive
because sports club committees cannot be relied upon, they do not keep records relating
to their clubs properly. Therefore, sports administrators insist that they need a proper
and formal records management policy to address this problem. With this study, we can
find out that sport club records are not good at managing their records and cause the
university archive does not have the latest sport club records.

4. University archive in UKZN has neglected the act of record keeping.

The university archive not only ignores sport club records but important records are
also ignored. It also does not play an overall role in record management. Neglect
happens as a result of a lack of knowledge and a strong recording culture in the
organisation. To ensure that records management runs smoothly from the creation until
disposition process, the archives must work with the sport club. This is because, each
stage of the record starts from creation so disposition is very important. Records will
not succeed in being kept properly if there is an incomplete stage in the life cycle of the
record. The sport administrators are keen to hold discussions with the archives to
establish good relations on both sides. In addition, the sport administrators also want to

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 know what records need to be kept in the university archive. When both of them have
a good relationship they will understand about records management and know their
respective roles in ensuring that the storage of sport club records can be stored properly,
neatly, orderly and can be retrieved when required. With this stated situation, it is
evident that the archives and the sports administration are less aware of record keeping.
University archives and records kept in the university archive are custodians of heritage
and heritage that needs to be preserved so that future generations can see the success of
the sport club, what competitions are contested, and their seniors. sport club records are
very important to keep because there is a lot of history going on at sport clubs. In
addition to paper based records, photos, films, videos are also records that must be kept.
Photographs, films, and videos can reveal insights into the student's experience that few
other kind of documentation can. Friendships, social groups, and the physical
surroundings are all revealed in such photographs. Therefore, it is very important that
sport club records are kept because the success of a sport club can inspire juniors to
also succeed in sports and academics. Thus, the archive must focus on successfully
managing records well so that the attitude of neglect of records does not happen again.

5. Four recommendations for UKZN to follow in its efforts to improve its record and
archive management methods:
a) The formation of an Archives and Records Management Advisory Committee
should consider the overall value of university records management. When the
advisory records committee performs its mission, it helps the creation of an
environment in which records management and archiving programmes can
work.
b) UKZN needs to think about the benefits gained when a researcher does research
on student records. Such information can be used as a promotion, history, and
changes that occur at UKZN are considered as progress. Student records may
be a requirement for securing research funding as a source of useful data.
University archivists have a specific role to maintain the record of individual
students, student groups, and campus life from both a scholarly and
administrative aspect.
c) The establishment of successful archival programmes necessitates archivists
taking on a more active role. To effectively capture student experiences, it is
critical that the archivist implements an innovative outreach campaign

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 emphasising the value of preserving and utilising student-related documents, as
well as alumni participation in the archives' programme. The archivist will need
to suggest that sport groups participate in unique documentary initiatives that
capture their sports highlights for posterity's benefit.
d) The sports union and the University Archives should collaborate closely to
ensure that vital records made by sports clubs find their way into the archives
for permanent preservation. The schedules used to govern record retention and
deletion should be prioritised. Records must be kept properly in order to be used
as a resource and a tool to boost an organization's efficiency. Universities'
records management operations should be codified through a combination of
rules, procedures, infrastructure, tools, training, and resources.

Conclusion

In conclusion, after this study was done, it can be concluded that student records and sports
club records are very difficult to obtain in the university archives. Keeping sports club records
is very difficult for the archives to manage because the sports club committee does not
cooperate to send their records to the archives. Therefore, university authorities should take the
initiative to establish good relations between university archives, sports unions and various
sports clubs in UKZN so that any problems that occur can be resolved amicably through
discussions.

Reference

Garaba, F. (2018). The neglected fond in university archives: The case of sport club records at

the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), Pietermaritzburg Campus, South Africa.

Records Management Journal, 28(2), 143-158.

https://doi-org.ezaccess.library.uitm.edu.my/10.1108/RMJ-11-2016-0043

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Appendix