Maintaining Course Records

Effective: April 30, 2012

Version History: Approved by EPC on November 30, 2011; approved by Campus Assembly April 17, 2012. Revised by the Teaching & Learning Committee in consultation with shared governance and campus input fall 2025; UCC confirmation April 17, 2026; EVCP approval June 5, 2026.

Policy Owner: Academic Affairs

Policy Contact(s): Jennifer Mencl (undergraduate), Erik Brown (graduate), Tracey Bolen (Registrar)

Instructors and academic units are responsible for maintaining records of student work and grade books, as follows:

1. Instructors and academic units should either return submitted student work to the student, or retain it for 30 days after grades for the class are posted to the student’s transcript. This provides students the opportunity to retrieve or review their work, as appropriate. 
2. After the retention period, any retained student work must be securely stored or discarded (following applicable University document-destruction procedures). 
3. A student may request that retained student work be retained until 30 days into the next semester (not including summer, so a request in the spring would require a unit to hold the work until 30 days into the following fall semester). A student must make this request to the instructor no later than the last day of final exam week; for terms without a final exam week, the request must be made by the last day of instruction for the session in which the class was offered. 
4. Instructors must maintain the privacy of student work and follow the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), Minnesota Government Data Practices Act (MGDPA), and the University’s Managing Student Records policy in retaining and returning student work. (For example, grades cannot be posted publicly and graded materials cannot be returned in such a way that anyone can see or ascertain the grade of a student.) 
5. Academic departments must retain grade books or their equivalents for a minimum of one year or, if a grade is appealed, until the end of the appeal. Instructors leaving the University must give all grading records to the department. 
6. Academic units must also be aware of and follow Administrative Policy: Managing University Records and Information.

Related information

• For instructors leaving the University: Granting instructors permission to someone else’s Canvas course site.
• Grade Accountability Policy
• Managing University Records and Information 

Definitions

Student Work: Materials a student has submitted for a class, including but not limited to, papers, projects, exams, problem sets, artwork, and architectural models.

Maintain: The process of keeping student work where it can be safely stored and accessed, whether submitted physically or electronically.