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Introduction
Universities generate records that cut across the broad spectrum of student life and activities. Elston (1979) noted that the nature of records varies as each student moves through the evaluative processes of academic performance and becomes involved in a wide range of social, political, intellectual and recreational activities. Students’ records is a wide-embracing term and the (International Council on Archives (ICA), 2013) identified fourfold explanations of what constitutes this genre of records. One of the explanations singled out for this study defined these to include some or all of the information created or received by a university, which documents inter alia student involvement in student organizations, athletics, extracurricular or leisure activities, social life, etc. Samuels (1992) noted that the term extracurricular encompasses all the activities – social, religious, athletic, political and cultural – that engage students outside of the classroom. These records, as the ICA (2013) noted, should be covered by an appraisal policy indicating the groups of documents to be destroyed at the end of retention periods or retained for permanent preservation. Similar to other records, student records document the history of the university and society in general. These are valuable assets for historical, genealogical and other types of research (ICA, 2013). Consequently, archival collections of primary source materials representing sport clubs document the rich sporting history of any university from its inception to the present.
Roberts (2008) defined a sport club as a group of students (and if the institution allows, faculty, staff and community members) who voluntarily organize to further their common interests in sports through participation and competition. Sport clubs typically operate within the student development and campus recreation programs, and report to a sport club administrator. Benefits of having a sport club include increase of student satisfaction and recruitment and retention of students (Roberts, 2008). In addition, sport clubs address the emotional behavior of students, as students are able to reduce stress, improve emotional well-being and happiness, build character and improve self-confidence (Roberts, 2008, p. 172). This work life balance mirrors human endeavor in all spheres of life as footprints of existence or as noted by Harris (2016) and Roe (2016) as evidence of the behavior and reactions of humans interacting in different times and spaces. Samuels (1992) aptly...