Twelve years of free, practitioner-led short courses on federal records management, information governance, and the policy and tooling that surround them. Five one-hour sessions a semester. No tuition, no pop quizzes, no product pitch: just 9,000+ records, IG, and compliance pros who've pulled up a chair.
RMU is a free, structured curriculum on federal records management, information governance, and the policy and tooling that surround them. The faculty are working practitioners. The lectures are short. The recordings stay up, so you're never the one left treading water in a flood of paperwork.
Each session is a self-contained one-hour course on a single subject: authorities, retention, electronic records operations, defensible disposition, and the wider RM governance landscape. Drop in for one. Take all five.
Every semester is co-led by working practitioners in records management, archives, FOIA, and federal information governance. They speak from programs they actually run, with the constraints, judgment calls, and trade-offs intact.
Tuition is free. Every session is recorded and added to the on-demand archive within 48 hours. There is no product pitch, no follow-up gate, and no certification fee. The newsletter is how registration opens for the next cohort.
These were the five sessions from last semester: a snapshot of how RMU covers the field. Titles, guests, and case material change every term, but the recordings stay up. All five are in the on-demand archive.
What does and does not qualify as a federal record across email, chat, shared drives, and line-of-business systems. Clear roles, decision rights, and the minimum controls required for defensible federal recordkeeping.
How federal retention schedules are built and justified using the General Records Schedules, agency schedules, and event-based triggers. Designing clear, enforceable retention rules that support both mission needs and compliance requirements.
Translating retention and classification requirements into enforceable controls within the tools agencies actually use. Email, messages, M365, collaboration spaces, cloud platforms. Practical governance patterns for unstructured content and AI-assisted workflows.
Disposition is where federal records programs succeed or fail. A repeatable workflow for eligibility, review, approvals, holds coordination, and destruction that stands up to oversight. Audit-ready documentation practices and managing legal holds in coordination with Counsel.
Records management as a core governance capability aligned with privacy, FOIA, cybersecurity, and AI initiatives across the agency. A practical modernization roadmap connecting RM to mission delivery and risk reduction.
Shannon Heim and Ray Davis have run RMU together across most of its 23 semesters. They moderate, they teach, and they curate the rotating slate of practitioner guests who join each semester.
Host of Records Management University for over six years. Volunteer since 2014. Has spent more than a decade creating and delivering content that helps records professionals navigate the field. Also the illustrator behind RMU's hand-drawn educational materials, including the ones on this page.
Records management veteran with over 20 years of experience. Long-time ARMA member who served as Regional Vice President. Has presented at almost countless webinars and conferences. Returning RMU instructor.
The Fall 2026 slate is still being set.
Each semester invites a new group of working records officers, archivists, FOIA leads, and federal information governance practitioners as session co-leads.
Know someone who'd make a great guest speaker, or want to put yourself forward?
Suggest a guest speakerRMU is older than most of the records platforms it talks about. Twelve years of it: Spring 2014 through Spring 2026, and still compounding.
What people usually ask before joining RMU. Still unanswered? Email RMU@feith.com and someone on the team will reply.
Skip to the sign-upRMU is a webinar series curated to educate professionals on every facet of records management, from foundational concepts to advanced practice. Topics include compliance, digital transformation, industry best practices, and real-world case studies.
The goal is actionable knowledge that transcends theory, so participants can navigate records management in their own programs.
Records managers, information governance professionals, compliance officers, IT managers, agency General Counsel staff, and anyone aiming to deepen their records management knowledge.
RMU runs Spring and Fall every year. The schedule for each semester is announced by email three to four weeks before the first session. The most recent semester wrapped May 12, 2026. The Fall 2026 lineup will be announced via the RMU newsletter.
Add yourself to the newsletter further down this page to be on the announcement list.
No. RMU is entirely free to attend. There is no certification fee, no membership tier, no follow-up paywall.
Yes. Every RMU session is recorded and added to the on-demand archive within 48 hours. Live attendees receive the recording by email. Newsletter subscribers receive a digest of new archive additions at the end of each semester.
A stable internet connection and the Zoom client. RMU recommends testing the application prior to the event to confirm everything works smoothly.
Yes. Every RMU session since 2014 is in the on-demand archive. 115 recordings, organized by topic area and by semester. Access is free and does not require a current registration.
The archive is the best way to use RMU between semesters: pick a topic area, pick a recent recording, and watch on your own schedule.
