The Oglala Sioux Tribe (OST) chartered OLC with the mission of coordinating and regulating higher education on the Pine Ridge Reservation. The implementation stresses the importance of maintaining Lakota culture and fostering tribal self-determination. Thus, requiring access to the permanent OST records and documents is necessary as educational resources.

The institutional records are unique to the extent that researchers are required to obtain authorization from the donating institution prior to reviewing documents in the collection. All three donating institutions - OLC, OST and AIHEC - have prepared standardized access policies to their collections, including request forms that are on file with the OLC Archivist. These institutions limit access to their collections to ensure that private family records (e.g., divorce and adoption records) and personal actions (e.g., legal claims, mandatory resignations) remain inaccessible to the public, as per federal, state, and tribal privacy laws. Researcher use of the institutional records is limited by the confidentiality of the requested material and the time required to obtain access permission from the donating institution for specific documents.

The OLC Archives conforms to the "Use and Restrictions" section of the SAA Code of Ethics, adopted in 1992, and to all current copyright laws. However, due to our current effort of making the Archives more functional and accessible (see our Temporary Closure statement), until further notice only the rare books and microfilm are available for research, and only by appointment.

Brief History

Description/Guidelines

Purpose

Duties