Drowning in a Sea of Paper Document Archiving With Technology Presented by Arthur J. Staerk AccuScan

There Are 3 Classes of Records for School Districts Permanent 100 years 7 years

School Districts Are Required to Maintain Records For: Business offices are required to keep their finance records for seven years. Payroll records must be kept forever Board meeting, audit and annual financial reports must be kept forever Personnel departments must keep active and inactive personnel files forever Student records must be kept for 100 years Special education files must be kept forever

Problems Facing School Districts Now and in the Future Lack of storage space Overstuffed filing cabinets Costly off-site storage facilities Waste of valuable time and money retrieving misfiled/misplaced documents in and out of the office

Problems Facing School Districts Now and in the Future (continued) Deterioration of stored documents in a uncontrolled environment Disintegration of microfilm in an uncontrolled climate Costly replacement of outdated microfilm readers

Did you know? An average organization: Makes 19 copies of each document Spends $20 in labor to file each document Spends $120 in labor searching for each misfiled document Loses one out of every 20 documents Spends 25 hours recreating each lost document Source: PricewaterhouseCoopers

As Districts Run Out of Space Records are lost and misfiled Records can suffer damage from fire, water or mold damage Inefficiency in retrieving records Classroom space lost to file storage How should school districts deal with this problem that grows every year?

DIGITAL!

Document archiving with digital technology is the capture, storage, communication and retrieval of paper based information in digitized form. (CD-ROM or hard drive) Stored documents can be retrieved on a computer through network access with password protection, CDs or DVDs. What is Digital Storage?

What Are Regulations? Paper and/or microfilm and/or scanned images are acceptable Full and complete copy of record must be kept regardless of storage media chosen Original records can be destroyed with written permission from the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission

Digital Record Management Will Permanently Solve The Storage of: Payroll records Personnel files (active and inactive) Student transcripts Special education files School board of directors minutes

Digital or Microfilm?

Advantages of Digital Storage Records can be accessed and printed on any computer Quick search capability Non-propriety file format, no special software is needed, will work on any computer Records can be ed or duplicated inexpensively

Disadvantages of Microfilm Limited access due to restricted availability of district microfilm reader Poor search capability Microfilm must be stored in controlled environment Readers are expensive and difficult to replace

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How Are Documents Converted to Digital Images? 1.Documents are purged and prepped for scanning. 2.Documents are scanned into a computer-based program. 3.Every image should be checked for quality before storage. 4.Required indexing is performed per file folder 5.Indexed files can be stored onto designated storage device. CD-ROM, DVD or hard drive 6.A security backup is recommended

School Districts Can Elect to Digitize Their Documents Themselves. This process is very costly and requires trained personnel that are familiar with Records Management and Record Retention Guidelines. Another solution is for school districts to use an outside vendor to convert their paper to digitized images

Things to Consider When Choosing an Outside Vendor: Ask for a demonstration. Check if they follow state guidelines and professional standards. What are their quality control procedures? Ask for 3-5 customer references. Get all estimated costs up front for scanning and any software you may want.

You May Ask, “Can We Afford to Scan Our Paper Files?” With unforeseen disasters that occur such as: Lost and misfiled records Fire, flood and other water damage Severe storm damage to facility Shelving deterioration and collapsing of storage boxes Theft How Can You Afford Not To?

Thank You For Your Interest Arthur J. Staerk AccuScan