Small Collection Processing
Is it a "Small collection?"
How is a small collection processed?
- The archivist will decide if a set of items will be its own collection, a series within another collection, or something else.
- A small collection is a complete collection with its own collection number and collection record in the archives catalog, but which doesn't take up enough space to warrant its own top container/box (e.g., 1-3 folders). Rather than waste materials and shelf space, the small collections are housed in shared boxes shelved in their own sequence in the stacks rather than in the normal collection sequence.
How is a small collection processed?
- It most ways, a small collection is processed the same as any other collection. The archivist will determine the level of description to be used, whether it is to be fully itemized or a simple collection-level record or somewhere in-between. Those records are entered into ArchivesSpace the same as larger collections.
- The difference is found in the Container Instances.
- Instead of the Top Container being numbered with the collection number and box sequence, e.g., Box M0093-1, it is numbered as the proper Small Collection container, Box SC02.
- The child container would typically be a folder labeled in the numerical sequence of the individual box. Each SC box contains folders 1-??, regardless of how many and which collections there are.
- Collection M0150 might have only one folder, but if it is the fifth folder in the third SC box, then the Container Instance would be: Top Container Box SC03, Child Type Folder, Child Indicator 5.
