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Accessioning

Past Perfect
The AAL utilizes Past Perfect to accession and catalog its collections.  A duplicate copy of this record is maintained off-site, and updated nightly syncing the lab’s system with a server in the Dean of Liberal and Applied Arts office.  Upon departmental approval (pending), this information will migrate to the TIDES server at the SFASU library.

Accessioning
Accession of any collection is predicated on creation of an accession file containing original documentation providing submitting archaeologist, including transfer of legal title or transfer of custodianship to the AAL, originally signed request for curation space at the AAL, certification of acceptance collection by the AAL for permitted projects, executed agreement between the THC and the AAL to hold state held-in-trust collections to include THC Artifact Curation Form and signed THC Held-in-Trust Agreement, transfer from sponsor form, accession record, collection processing record, collections inventory, and summary number series form.  Completion of the AAL required forms assumes complete cataloging.  The AAL will maintain collection in lot order, and will assign a bag number for the purpose of entering collection into Past Perfect system.  This bag number will include a prefix of “SFA” to further establish jurisdiction.  Accession numbers are created by using year of accession (i.e. 2008), accession number (i.e. 1), and bag number (i.e. 1) to produce a unique address within the catalog of SFA2008.1.1 which will then be translated into that item’s location within the repository.

Procedures for the Accession of Donations
A donation is assigned an accession number and catalogued to artifact category and type level.  Items in collection are marked with an accession number and a sequential number for each individual class or type of artifact present in collection.  If information exists to attribute material to a site, a state trinomial and a sequential number will be assigned to each individual class or type of artifact and marked on artifacts.  If specific locations or proveniences can be assigned to objects, this will be recorded in the database along with location.

Deaccessioning and Disposal of Collections or Collected Items
Only the THC has authority to deaccession entire collections and must concur with curatorial facility’s recommendation. Authority to deal with deaccessioning of approved categories of objects and samples from state-associated held-in-trust collections is delegated to a certified curatorial facility through the Agreement for Approved Categories of Objects.  Deaccessions are evaluated in terms of: redundancy and lack of additional merit; lack of historical, cultural, or scientific value; damage beyond reasonable use and repair; being subject to deaccessions as required by federal law; being noted as missing or stolen.  Deaccessioned items from this facility are made available to east Texas museums or research facilities as a not-for-profit donation.  State-associated held-in-trust collections will never be disposed of by sale, and an annual report of deaccessioning activities will be made to the THC regarding these collections.

 

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