The collection consists of materials acquired by Special Collections and the University Archives and maintained for purposes of historical research. It includes reports, correspondence, committee minutes, course materials, architectural and other drawings, newspaper and magazine clippings, press releases, posters, brochures, and other published materials. The materials are arranged alphabetically by subject or name (e.g. organisations, University departments, events, buildings/places, and individuals).

Fonds consists of the class minute book (1921-1923), photographs from the Great Trek, as well as materials from reunions held in 1963, 1968 and the 50th-anniversary reunion in 1973.

The fonds consists of handwritten minutes from a special meeting (March 1917) of the Class of 1916 at which members discussed the possibility of establishing an Alumni Association. Also included are two scrapbooks. The first, assembled by A. Irene (Vermilyea) Menzies in 1972, provides information about the class's members after graduation, university faculty, and the early history of the university, handwritten with newspaper clippings. The second scrapbook includes biographical information about early UBC graduates from 1916 to 1922 – handwritten, with clippings from Annual yearbooks.

The fonds consists of correspondence, minutes, financial records, course outlines and materials, papers submitted to the Medieval Workshop, and video recordings. The records reflect the Committee's involvement in devising an interdisciplinary course of study (1972-1977) for students interested in the medieval field, and the Committee's role in organizing the annual Medieval Workshop at UBC (1973-1979). The video recordings are from a series entitled Beyond the Memory of Man in which members of the Committee appeared.

The fonds consists of six series which contain the following: student publications, curriculum offerings and course descriptions, handbooks, examinations, faculty information, committee meetings, interdepartmental memoranda and correspondence, meeting reports and annual reports, elections, curriculum revisions, reading lists, a “departmental bible,” departmental newsletters and bulletins, departmental meeting minutes, council policy and membership, reorganization proposals, and task force information, notable alumni ephemera, and the UBC Medal for Canadian Biography All records are the results of activities that took place within the Department of English from 1940 to the early 2000s.