We are trying to organize our various holdings at our museum.  There are
several different collections here that have been used in the past.  There
is of course the permanent collection where all items are formally
accessioned.  Then we have a couple of other collections with various other
levels of registration.  My question is this:  An item is in your permanent
collection, but for whatever reason the Collections committee has seen fit
that the item does not exactly fit the strict requirements for the
Permanent collection. We do not want to "dispose" of it, just "reclassify"
it to our Education or Exhibit Prop collection so that it may be used more
appropriately.  I define deaccession as "formally removing an item from the
PERMANENT collection" while others here have associated the term
with "Disposal of an item from the permantent collection", which to their
understadning meant the museum getting rid of it.  Does a formal
deaccession need to take place if an unrestricted item is simply being put
in an Education Collection, not thrown away, sold, transferred or in any
other way disposed of?

Also, what kind of levels of registration do some of you go to for an item
that is in a "study" or "education" collection?

Steven Stewart

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