Archiving

[jtoland]

Hi guys i was wondering if when a member of staff leaves do we have to archive there emails or just get rid of them

[elsiegee40]

It is safer to archive

[MrFrostmaul]

We archive their email and documents areas for minimum a year.

For certain staff such as Admin Staff, Head, Finance etc. we keep their mailboxes for longer for audit trails etc.

 

Overall, if you have the space it's better to archive. We have a 3TB external just for archived data

Edited July 26, 2015 by MrFrostmaul

[jtoland]

Ok cool thanks

[rpettit]

We use Veeam for our archiving as well as regular backups. It is able to restore AD accounts and e-mails quickly if needed

[ChickenDhansak]

+1 for archiving

[GrumbleDook]

Ok ... let's have a complete look at the lifecycle on records and archiving.

 

As part of the daily toil all staff will produce copious amounts of documents and the official stuff needs to be formally recorded. Generally this will be held in designated locations such as the MIS, recorded in minutes of meetings, etc .. but some won't.

 

Emails of discussions around disclosures, SEN, etc can sometimes be needed for reviews once staff have left. It is easy enough for those emails to be dragged and dropped onto a centrally kept area on a file share, with a name for the student or uploaded as attachments on their record on the MIS. This should be done as part of ongoing daily tasks and not a last minute clear out before the member of staff leaves. However, before they go you should check with them that they have put all relevant conversations and files on the MIS or whatever location the school has chosen.

 

Materials created by the member of staff during their employment are, if other arrangement has been put in place, the IP of the school. These should be stored centrally and under the control of the HoD, where appropriate. This should be done as part of ongoing work and not a last minute thing ...

 

Personal documents should be removed prior to the member of staff leaving. Remind them that the Head or other authorised and designated staff may review the home area, emails , etc for a period of time after they have left ...

 

It will usually be the Business Manager or Bursar who has the Information and Records Management Schedule, which tells you how long information and records has to be kept for your school. By doing the above it should make it easier to comply with this without creating a massive burden for archiving. If you don't do the above then you face needing to archive all emails, files, etc for the maximum amount of time in the IRMS ... mainly because you don't know what is where.

 

Simple rules ... if something has to be kept a long time never leave the sole copy in an individual area (home area, mailbox), make sure people keep things up to date and if in doubt then archive against your agreed schedule.