A new policy has been introduced by the Representative Church Body Library to guide Church of Ireland primary schools in how to best keep and share archived information about their work and service. This follows lengthy discussions with all organisations involved, and in consultation with the Secretary of the General Synod Board of Education.

The document – A Policy for the Appropriate Custody of Primary School Records – has been produced with the aim of promoting awareness about the importance of primary school records and their value as a reference tool for a variety of legal, educational, historical and social purposes in the future, and seeks to ensure that the schools management take the correct steps to arrange and safeguard these materials.

This is particularly relevant where records have ceased to be used in the day-to-day administration of a school, or in circumstances where a school is due to close or has already closed.

While the RCB Library is concerned about the preservation of these records, the Library is not itself the custodian of primary school records and is not responsable for the long-term storage of such records.

The Library has, however, been in discussion with colleagues in the National Archives of Ireland and the Local Government Archivists and Records Managers (LGARM) Group representing archivists and records managers at local government level. LGARM has…