The UBC community is invited to comment on the proposed amendments to the Deaccessioning Policy (UP11) (the “Policy”).
The Deaccessioning Policy was first approved in March 2000 and has not undergone a formal review by a Policy Development Committee since 2004. The Policy governs the reasons and processes for removing objects from the collections held by the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, the Museum of Anthropology and the University Library. Since that time, the University has welcomed the following new galleries and museums: the UBC Okanagan Art Gallery established in 2020, the return of the Pacific Museum of Earth, which was the University’s first museum in 1925, and the Beaty Biodiversity Museum in 2010.
A Policy Development Committee (the “Committee”) has been convened to develop proposed amendments and has prepared a draft proposal. The primary objectives of the proposed amendments are to align the Policy with best practices and ensure consistency with other Board of Governors’ policies.
More specifically, the Committee’s most notable proposed amendments to the Policy are:
- changes to reflect the new units on campus that house important collections which did not exist in 2000, and the deaccessioning needs of those units;
- distinguishing reasons for deaccession and methods of disposition, and clearly setting out the decision-making processes for each; and
- removal of elements relating to repatriation, currently applicable only to the Museum of Anthropology, which will be addressed in a separate policy broadly applicable across all units of the University.
For further information about the proposed amendments, please see the information package that was provided to the Board of Governors at: Proposed Policy Amendment: Deaccessioning Policy (UP11).
The proposed amendments are now being published and all members of UBC’s community are encouraged to provide their comments. Please submit feedback to the Office of the University Counsel at university.counsel@ubc.ca by January 9, 2026.
Feedback received by the Office of the University Counsel from the UBC community will be provided to the members of the Committee for review and consideration. The Committee does not provide individual responses to persons submitting feedback. However, the feedback received will be summarized, along with the Committee’s response, in a Community Consultation Summary that will be included in the submission materials that are generally shared in open sessions of meetings of the responsible Board committee and the Board of Governors.