How to Write Committee Meeting Minutes + Template

In the governance structure of a higher education establishment, committees are essential for feeding into the council and advising on its key responsibilities. To do so, bodies such as the audit and risk committee, strategy and investment committee and ethics and values committee must bring together experts in their field to discuss, debate and make decisions based on the most pressing issues within their remit. They then help the council put in place policies, procedures and strategies to drive the institution forwards. 

This requires a robust meeting procedure that begins with a clear and focused agenda, continues through an expertly chaired meeting and concludes with committee meeting minutes that accurately represent the discussions and decisions, as well as highlighting action points. 

Not only do higher education providers have to consider their corporate responsibilities, but they often have additional obligations due to charity status and the fact they might be in receipt of public funds. This is what makes it so important to ensure that committees adhere to the correct procedures and provide the most appropriate advice to the council. This article helps you create meeting minutes for your committee in a clear and intuitive manner to ensure the council is as well-informed as possible. 

Key takeaways

• Effective meeting minutes should have a clear structure and be factual
• Avoid jargon, unnecessary detail and subjective phrasing
• Have attendees feed back on and review meeting minutes, checking for accuracy and clarity on academic discussion
• Document actions and assignees for greater accountability
• Consider the governance obligations of the higher education committee

Key elements of committee meeting minutes

Element	Explanation
Date, time and location	Ensure you note the basics of the meeting, as this will give the minutes historical context when looking through in the future. Add the time of adjournment as well as when it was called to order.
Attendees and absentees	To provide accountability, it is important to create a list of attendees to know who was in the room when discussions happened and the committee made decisions.
Agenda and discussion points	The minutes should follow the format of the meeting agenda, noting the business discussed and the nature of the debate that took place. This will help stakeholders understand how the committee reached the conclusions it passed onto the council.
Decisions	It is essential to record what decisions were made for each of the action items. This will help when reporting on the committee’s work to the university or college council.
Record of votes	Note who voted which way on the decisions and the result of the voting. This is key to the audit trail of the meeting.
Actions	Not all decisions signify the end of the committee’s work. Some may require stakeholders to carry out tasks after the meeting. Note any actions that must take place as a result of the decisions. Assign committee members to the action items and set deadlines to instil accountability.
Supporting documents	You might want to add supplementary materials from the meeting to the minutes to illustrate some of the points discussed, including reports and presentations.

How to take committee meeting minutes

Avoid misinterpretation of discussions

Academic discussion can involve the use of jargon that meeting attendees use on a daily basis, but which might not be familiar to the person taking the minutes. If this is the case, it is acceptable to ask for clarification when taking notes, or following the meeting, to ensure you have captured the nature of the debate correctly. 

The minutes are the official record of what happened during the meeting and explain why it made certain decisions, making it essential to get right. If there is an issue in the future, you can easily discover what happened. Write up the minutes as soon as you can, possibly using a minute taking tool, so that you accurately recall the events in the room. 

Verify the details of the meeting

You must be able to find the details of the relevant meeting minutes in the future in case of, for example, an audit related to funding, an investigation over misconduct or if someone wants to understand the process behind a specific instance of decision-making. This means that the date and time of the meeting must be correct and you should also be able to find out who was in the room and involved. 

Have the attendees verify their name and position to ensure you create an accurate record of the meeting and evidence of people’s contributions, as well as details of the expertise within the room when they made decisions. 

Seek feedback from committee members and correct accordingly

It is in everyone’s interests to ensure the meeting is recorded accurately in the minutes, so send your draft to committee members and ask for feedback, corrections and clarifications. By doing this ahead of the next meeting, you save the time of busy academics and ensure they can approve the previous minutes beforehand without having to waste valuable meeting time amending and approving them. 

Where there are missing details, incomplete information or incorrect entries, gain the input of members to make sure the document is an accurate representation of the events. 

Ensure clarity and conciseness

Minutes are not meant to be a verbatim record of what stakeholders said in the meeting; rather, they should capture the essence of the discussions and record the outcomes.

As such, you should write them with clarity in mind. Re-read and think about whether someone who wasn’t in the meeting room would gain a good understanding of what happened. Be concise too; there is no need for extraneous detail. Instead, aim for an accurate overview.

Remember that these minutes will help take issues to the main university or college council to help their decision-making, so you need to extract the key information to inform discussion at that higher level without overloading stakeholders with excessive detail.

Distribute to get final approval

Once you have the feedback from the meeting attendees and have updated your draft, send the document out to receive final approval. This finalises the process and means that you can be sure that the consensus is that they are an accurate representation of the meeting. 

Archive and organise

Once the meeting participants approve the minutes, you can archive the document for future reference. Make sure it is easy to retrieve when needed, labelling it with key words and organising it to make it easy to search for if the need arises. As a legal document, it should be available upon request so make sure you have a safe and secure system in place to manage files. 

Committee meeting minutes template

Click here to download a meeting minutes template for higher education committee meetings.

Best practices for taking accurate minutes

• Prepare by reviewing the agenda and familiarising yourself with the running order of the meeting and background to the discussion points.
• Use a consistent meeting minutes format, creating a template to make the process more intuitive and clear to read.
• Write objectively and ensure to record the nature of the discussion without giving your opinion on matters.
• Capture key decisions and actions so there is a record of them and a reference to guide the next steps.
• Avoid jargon and vague wording. You want people reading the minutes in the future to understand exactly what happened at the meeting.
• Ensure accuracy before you finalise the minutes, asking for feedback and input from meeting attendees to provide a clear picture of the meeting.

FAQ

Who is responsible for writing the minutes in a committee meeting?

The committee should designate someone as committee secretary to record and draft the meeting minutes, preparing them for approval by committee members. 

Who should receive the minutes?

Distribute the minutes to all committee members and attendees, before storing them in the institution’s official records for reference and compliance purposes.

How long should committee meeting minutes be?

Minutes should be concise yet comprehensive, with one to three pages being a good rule of thumb. Ensure they capture key discussions, decisions and action points without unnecessary detail.

Can meeting minutes be edited after they are approved?

Once approved, minutes should not be altered, but corrections can be appended in subsequent meetings with a clear official record of the amendments.

What should be done if minutes contain errors?

If you find errors before the committee approves the minutes, you can make the necessary adjustments and distribute them to all relevant stakeholders for approval. If you find errors after approval, they should be formally raised in the next meeting, corrected with committee approval and documented in the revised version.

Are committee meeting minutes legally binding?

Higher education committee meeting minutes are not legally binding in the UK, but the Office for Students recommends institutions in England “make publicly available the minutes of the meetings of its governing body and committees, except where such material is genuinely confidential.” It is also good governance practice to take minutes and keep them as a formal record, particularly to ensure transparent decision-making in establishments that are in receipt of public money. 

References and further reading

• What is a note-taker? 
• Who is the chair of a committee?
• What is good governance in higher education?
• Higher education code of governance
• University committee structure