News, Documentary, and Television
The Good Practice for TV Archives Management grid is a practical tool designed to help
organizations assess the preservation status of their television collections and determine their next steps toward sustainable archival management. Created by the Association of Moving Image Archivists’ News, Documentary, and TV Committee, this grid provides a structured, adaptable framework for evaluating four key functional areas:
Each area is mapped across five levels, from Level 0 (Initial Situation) to Level 4 (Sustainable), helping organizations to identify where they currently stand and what improvements they can aim for in a given area.
Effective archival management of television collections is essential to the long-term value, accessibility, and impact of broadcast media. Well-managed archives support programming, legal compliance, institutional memory, and public trust, helping avert the loss of irreplaceable materials.
The Value of Knowing What You Have: Effective archives management gives you accurate knowledge of your holdings. Without solid documentation and description, valuable footage may remain inaccessible, underutilized, or lost entirely. Descriptive metadata, file inventories, and rights information empower stations to reuse or monetize their content, respond to legal requests, and plan preservation efforts more efficiently. You can’t use what you can’t find.
Celebrating Your Station’s Legacy: When stations invest in sustainable archival practices, they gain the ability to share their legacy through anniversaries, retrospectives, community outreach, and digital platforms. These moments strengthen audience loyalty and reinforce the station’s role as a trusted community voice.
Historical, Cultural, and Institutional Value: TV archives document the people, places, and events that shape our communities and society. The historical and cultural significance of these records only grows over time. At the same time, the archives serve as a unique institutional asset, documenting the evolution of a station’s voice, values, and impact.
Legal and Compliance Value: Proper documentation of ownership, rights, and broadcast history helps protect stations from liability and supports transparency. As media organizations face increasing scrutiny, well-maintained archives provide the evidence needed to support claims, resolve disputes, and manage risk.
This is a guide that can be tailored to fit your organization’s capacity, goals, and archival users’ needs. You may find that your collection falls at different levels across different areas, or even within different collections within your organization. That’s normal and expected. The goal is to use this tool to help set priorities and make informed decisions about first steps in your preservation efforts.
Remember: start where you are. Collections management can feel overwhelming. It’s ok to be at level zero across the board. This grid can be used as a roadmap to help navigate the process, whether you’re just beginning or working toward long-term sustainability. This resource is part of a broader set of advocacy tools to support TV archives, helping institutions of all sizes strengthen their preservation practices and ensure the longevity of their collections.
What this grid doesn’t cover. For more information on areas that aren’t covered by this grid, view the Further Resources document below. This includes: format identification, digitization vendors/archival suppliers, digital asset management systems, grants, and technical recommendations.
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