General Records vs. Personal Information

The records under the custody or control of the University of Guelph fall into two categories: general records and personal information records. Through the Access and Privacy website, you can find where the General Records and Personal Information Banks are located in order to make formal and informal inquiries for access.

General Records

A general record is any record relating to the operations or administration of a department or unit which does not contain personal information. These can be records of events, procedures, media releases, workshops, budgets, minutes, and policies. Many of these general records are readily available through regular University publications and websites and can be found through our eReading Room.

For general records that are not already publicly available, you can make a request to the department which holds those records in order to access them. If you are uncertain which departments holds the records, contact the University Secretariat. 

Personal Information

Personal information is recorded information about an identifiable individual [s.2(1)].  Many departments require the collection of personal information for specific functions. It is the responsibility of these offices to provide notice about the use of this information when it is collected [s.39(2)], and it is the responsibility of the individual to read this notice and the department's privacy and record retention policies.

Unlike general records, personal information records are not publicly accessible and can only be requested the individual in question (with certain exceptions). Every person has the right to review and make corrections to his or her own personal information that is held within the University [s.47(1)].