If your question is not listed, please feel free to contact us.
GENERAL
Who is eligible for membership?
Which materials may be archival?
Which materials are not usually considered to be archival?
Surely that doesn’t cover everything?
What should I do with my collections of published material?
What should I do with my collections of local newspapers?
So does the format make something archival and does everything archival need to be saved?
How old must items be to be considered archival?
Which software should I use for my archival descriptions?
How can we let people know what our archives has?
FUNDING
What funding is available through CANB?
Can CANB help me write my project application?
Why was my application rejected?
What should I do if I can’t finish my project on time?
GENERAL
What is CANB?
CANB is made up of archives in the province working together to strengthen their capacity to better preserve and make accessible the documentary heritage in their holdings.
What can CANB do for me?
CANB provides advice to member institutions on any and all aspects of archival work – setting up an archives, moving an archives, training new volunteers and staff, working on projects, gaining intellectual control of your holdings, preserving your holdings, creating emergency plans, performing a global assessment, and more. Archives Advisor Shannon Doiron is available to travel to your archives – for free! Education and training events are planned each year, with at least one held in conjunction with the annual general meeting, usually held in April or May.
Who is eligible for membership?
Any institution with archival holdings can become a member. We do not offer individual memberships; one membership covers all staff and volunteers in an institution.
How do I become a member?
Fill out our membership form and send a cheque for $45.00. This fee covers the fiscal year from April 1 to March 31, and covers all of our services.
What can I do for CANB?
We are always looking for new Executive Committee members. The average commitment is about an hour a month, plus three full-day meetings a year. If you are interested, please contact us.
Which materials may be archival?
-
Paper documents
-
Photographs
-
Unpublished audio material (cassette tapes, vinyl records, reel-to-reel, etc.)
-
Unpublished video material (VHS tapes, DVDs, etc.)
-
Electronic material (digital photographs, MS Office documents, MP3s, etc.)
-
Scrapbooks including published material (e.g. scrapbooks of newspaper clippings)
Which materials are not usually considered to be archival?
-
Published material (books, published audio and video material, published electronic records)
-
Artifacts
Surely that doesn’t cover everything?
No, there are some things that fall into a grey area. Maps, pamphlets, newspapers, and some types of recordings may or may not be archival.
What should I do with my collections of published material?
Many institutions choose to treat collections of published ephemera (pamphlets, cards, etc.) as special collections material – in effect, as archival – or to treat them as archival when such material is part of a person’s or group’s records. Books may be organized and stored as library items rather than as archival items.
What should I do with my collections of local newspapers?
Please check with the Provincial Archives to see if good quality microfilm copies exist. If so, you do not need to try to preserve them. It is very difficult to preserve newsprint, which is on highly acidic and poor-quality paper. It may make sense for your institution to rely on the microfilm copy.
So does the format make something archival and does everything archival need to be saved?
Whether or not a record is archival has more to do with being unique and containing informational, evidential, or intrinsic value. Determining these values and deciding what should be preserved are important parts of “doing” archival work. No matter what size of institution you are involved with and how small your holdings are currently, you won’t be able to keep everything. Being able to draw upon the experience of others to develop these skills is an important part of what can be gained from being involved with CANB.
How old must items be to be considered archival?
There is no time limit; archives run from the beginning of recorded history until yesterday. You would be surprised how quickly people’s memories of the recent past fade.
Which software should I use for my archival descriptions?
Any database will work for storing archival descriptions as long as you can set the fields to reflect the standard ways to describe fonds and collections. We strongly recommend against using spreadsheets (e.g. Microsoft Excel).
Members of CANB are now able to upload their archival descriptions to an open-sourced and open-access platform, called AtoM (short for Access to Memory). By storing your descriptions in this manner, you will be joining a great number of archives across the country who are committed to improving public access of archival holdings.
How can we let people know what our archives has?
There are a few options, including putting your descriptions on your website, but the way to make the holdings most widely accessible is through our new online database for archival descriptions, ArchivesCANB. If you are interested in learning how to use AtoM, and would like to store your decriptions on a secure server financed through CANB, please contact the Archives Advisor.
We contribute to the Canadian Heritage Information Network for our museum items. Is it the same process to contribute to AtoM?
In addition to the description fields being different, there are two important differences between CHIN and AtoM. CHIN stresses the item while AtoM requires collection or fonds level descriptions.
What is a fonds?
A fonds is all of the records created, used and accumulated by a single organization, individual or juridical person during the transaction of daily business. All archival records are organized by fonds.
FUNDING
What funding is available through CANB?
The CANB-New Brunswick Provincial Grant is usually announced in the spring. This is a provincial funding program run by CANB through funding from the Department of Wellness, Culture and Sport.
Can CANB help me write my project application?
Yes. Contact the Archives Advisor for help. If your project relates to preservation, please contact the Preservation Advisor. Assistance can include training sessions on archival best practices, application or grant-writing assistance, as well as answering questions that come up in the course of working on an archival project itself.
Why was my application rejected?
Reasons for not funding an application are supplied to applicants. Both programs are routinely oversubscribed – we receive requests for more money than we have to give. Projects are therefore evaluated and ranked on merit, with the highest-scoring projects being funded. It may be that other applications made a stronger case for the funding or better met the criteria. You are welcome to re-submit your proposal next year, but you may wish to contact the Archives Advisor to discuss the reasons it didn’t succeed and review how it could be improved and what you can do until the next deadline to put your archives in a stronger position to apply.
What should I do if I can’t finish my project on time?
If there is any indication that you cannot finish a project, you should immediately contact CANB. CANB will sometimes be able to give you an extension. If the project cannot be completed by the deadline, you will have to return the unused money. Failure to complete a project, report on its completion, or return funds makes an institution ineligible for future funding.