This November, PUC’s Walter C. Utt Center for Adventist History received “Approved” accreditation status from the General Conference Office of Archives, Statistics, and Research (ASTR). This accreditation is the second highest rank that is possible to achieve and will last until 2025.
To earn the status of “Approved,” an archive must pass with minimum scores in three areas: staffing and oversight, physical location and preservation, and policies. After a site visit in March to evaluate these three areas, the accreditation team at ASTR submitted a report to the Utt Center outlining commendations and recommendations alongside a final status of “Approved.”
Accreditors particularly commended the Utt Center for “the high standards attained in managing these collections,” while PUC Administration was commended for supporting the Utt Center through the construction of the new library wing. They added that this new special collections space and reading room, when completed, will be impressive, efficient, and in keeping with archival best practices.
PUC’s Utt Center is named for influential Adventist historian Walter C. Utt, who taught at the college for thirty-four years and chaired the department of history. The center joins other institutions that hold General Conference Archives Accreditation, including the Center for Adventist Research at Andrews University and the Roy Graham Library Special Collections at Newbold College of Higher Education, among others.
GC ASTR website lists PUC as accredited: https://www.adventistarchives.org/accreditation