Records pertaining to the Office of the Chancellor/President. Personal papers of University Chancellors/Presidents at large are in Record Group 4.

The importance of the records of the Office of the Chancellor/President is twofold: first, they reflect the operations of the office itself, and secondly, they contain information about most activities taking place at the University.

The President’s files can also be used to reconstruct- in part- the files of other University offices. The files contain letters and memoranda of Deans and administrators giving details of activities and important policy decisions. The files also may contain runs of minutes from policymaking bodies kept for the information of the President.

The President of the University usually serves a public relations function. Although there may be offices that provide information about university activities to the public, usually the President (or a key subordinate) will sign the letters or make the speeches that transmit university messaging.

However, the files of the Office of the President are primarily kept to aid the President in the day-to-day duties of the office. They are not necessarily set up to provide a researcher with summary data about how a particular office operated at a particular date or what was the established policy at a given time. Instead, the files are generally chronological- often-yearly- accumulations of letters, memoranda, notes and background materials. They often reflect minor decisions made over time, not broad policy decisions. As such, they reflect the reality of modern bureaucracy. The activities and functions of offices, the University as a whole, as well as subordinate offices and departments, are ruled not so much by legislation (in the case of the University, legislation would be from the Board of Trustees), but a matter of accumulated decisions. The real function of an office may be as much a reflection of a certain incumbent or a gradual growth of function over time.

The records of the President often contain many memorandum concerning appraisals of programs and suggestions for the addition of new programs or the alteration of existing ones. As such, it is often difficult to determine what was actually decided. In some cases, the information concerning a decision does not exist (for example, a response was made verbally, not otherwise recorded, documentation of it was not retained, or documentation was not transferred to University Archives).