Series 7 - Student records

Title and statement of responsibility area

Title proper

Student records

General material designation

Textual record

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Level of description

Series

Repository

University of King's College Archives

Reference code

CA NSHK UKC.REG-7

Edition area

Edition statement

Edition statement of responsibility

Class of material specific details area

Statement of scale (cartographic)

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Issuing jurisdiction and denomination (philatelic)

Dates of creation area

Date(s)

1886 - 2009 (Creation)

Creator

University of King's College Registrar's Office

Physical description area

Physical description

50 linear m of textual records (10,952 individual student files), including approximately 3,000 photographs.

Publisher's series area

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Archival description area

Name of creator

University of King's College Registrar's Office

(1803 - present)

Administrative history

The position of Registrar was established by The Statutes, Rules and Ordinances of the University of King's College at Windsor in the Province of Nova Scotia, 1803. The other officers of the University were the "Vice-President, or Dean, Bursar, and Proctors." The structure of this element of the University of King’s College administration continued with minor adjustments through to the 1950s.

In 1954, the Board of Governors moved that "a small committee be appointed to review the whole internal administration of the College, and to define the respective duties of the Treasurer, the Bursar, the Registrar, the Dean of Residence, the Dean of Divinity, the Public Relations Officer, and other officers of administration, and to confer with the incoming President at their mutual convenience and to report to the Executive at the earliest possible date. The Report of the Bishop's Committee on Personnel, presented to the Board in Nov 1954, recommended the creation of the position of Vice President and combining the Registrar and Public Relations Officer positions into one role.

In recent decades, the Registrar's role has grown from a part time position held by a professor who also had teaching responsibilities, to a full time Registrar whose office has several staff members and operates on a business model designed to maintain and even increase revenue to the University.

The Office takes care of students' day-to-day requests and assists them throughout their undergraduate years. In addition to recruitment, admissions, registration, academic advising and Encaenia, the Registrar's activities include retention of students; presiding at Matriculation; distributing scholarships and bursaries; calculating grade point averages; determining eligibility for graduation and Encaenia award winners; and issuing transcripts. The Registrar's Office responds to requests for information and assistance from students who present a wide range of questions, problems or concerns; staff are in regular contact with other student service units at King's and Dalhousie to provide individual support, referral and case management.

The Registrar's Office is a student's primary resource for scholarships, bursaries and financial aid. Staff provide individual financial advising and budgeting assistance, offer information about bursaries and temporary loan programs, and assist in resolving problems with student loans.

Custodial history

Scope and content

The student records series is the largest series of records in the Archives. The series consists of the individual academic records of students who matriculated at the University of King's College between 1886 and 2009. The records before 1922 relate to the University's campus in Windsor, Nova Scotia, while records after that date were created at the University's Halifax location .

The student records were generated by the Registrar's Office staff, who create a file folder for each student who applies to King's. If the student subsequently enrolls, the file is maintained through the student's academic career at the University, recording the student's academic activities and progress. Correspondence from a prospective student who later registered enrolled is filed in that person's student record in this series, not in the Registrar's Office correspondence series. If the student is not accepted or does not enroll, the file is kept for one year in case the student reapplies.

During the processing of the student records, attempts were made to resolve ambiguities in student names and dates. A few of the student records show no evidence that the student ever completed enrolment or took a class at King's, or else the student enrolled and started classes a year or more later. In those cases, the record is filed with the year the student started taking classes, if that can be determined. If it cannot, then the record is filed according to the year the identification number was issued.

There are many gaps in the student records holdings in the Archives. The first student record is from 1886, and for the next two decades, there are no more than three records per year. At times, the policy was to destroy student records after the student left King's; for several years in the 1980s, the only remaining record of a student is a Kardex card (13 cm x 20 cm), with courses typed on it, grades, awards and degrees noted, and usually a small photograph of the student stapled on the lower right corner of the card.

Notes area

Physical condition

Immediate source of acquisition

Arrangement

The records are arranged in sub-series chronologically by the year a student enrolled at King's. The records in each sub-series are arranged alphabetically by student name.

The following files were removed from Record Group UKC.C (Registrar), established by John Weeren in his 1993 finding aid, and have been placed with University of King's College Residence records to be arranged and described in future:

UKC.C Vol 2.1: Residency Register, 1807-1836
UKC.C Vol.2.2: Residency Register, 1861-1875
UKC.C Series 3: Student Records (non~King's residential)

The student records were in colour-coded file folders when they arrived in the Archives. During this project, they were all placed in acid-free file folders. The folder colour codes were:

Red: B.A. and B.A. (FYP) students
Blue: B.Sc. students
Orange: B.J.H. students
Tan: B.J. (one-year degree)
Yellow: N.D.J. (non-degree Journalism)
Green: V.S.S.J. (visiting student in the School of Journalism)

In 2002, the Registrar's Office created a system to track files removed for administrative use: distinctively coloured "out folders" were used to mark the place where a record was removed by a staff member. Several of these out folders were found during processing, which means those records are missing.

Language of material

Script of material

Location of originals

Availability of other formats

Restrictions on access

Access to student records is restricted for privacy reasons.

Terms governing use, reproduction, and publication

Finding aids

File list available.

Uploaded finding aid

university-of-kings-college-registrars-office-fonds.pdf

Associated materials

Foundation Year Programme and School of Journalism administrators also create a record for each student enrolled in those programs. Those files are in the FYP and Journalism fonds (which have not been arranged or described). They usually contain a photocopy of the student's enrolment application, and essays written for the program or documentation of grade disputes.

The Registrar's Office maintains a database of student records. The Advancement Office also has a database of alumni.

Related materials

Accruals

Although most of the registration process has been done online since 2000, with paper records scanned into a digital database, hard-copy files are still maintained for students. Further accruals are expected.

General note

After a prospective student pays the enrollment deposit, he or she is assigned a unique student identification number in the Banner automated system, which enables the student to access online enrolment forms. In the late 20th century, student identification numbers began with a K followed by digits. Around 1999, student i.d. numbers changed to "Boo" numbers, so-called because the number started with the letter B and two zeros, i.e., BOO.