Digital archives for schools, colleges
and universities

🏛️ Archive & Heritage

Store, organise and bring your history to life. SocialArchive gives your institution a secure, searchable home for every photograph, document, yearbook and film, with the tools to make it matter.

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🏛️
The Archive
Everything. One place.
Ingested
0 items archived
  • Bryanston Logo
  • Hutchesons' Grammar School Logo
  • Laytmer Foundation Hammersmith logo
  • St Peters School York Logo
  • Bournemouth Collegiate School logo
  • Brentwood School Logo
  • Delphian School Logo
  • Bermuda College Logo
  • Duke of York's Royal Military School logo
  • Gordons School logo
  • Stover School Logo
  • Pownall Hall School Logo
  • Rowan Prep School Logo
  • Victoria College Logo

PRESERVE

One secure home for everything your institution has ever created

From old photographs and audio reels to school magazines and video footage, your history is probably scattered across filing cabinets, hard drives and forgotten inboxes. SocialArchive brings it all together in a single, cloud-based archive that's searchable, secure and built to last.

Whether you're working with professional archival standards or simply digitising a box of old photographs, the platform adapts to you, with flexible metadata, custom fields and cataloguing tools that work the way your institution does.

  • Everything becomes findable. Every document is OCR-indexed, every audio and video recording auto-transcribed, every person identifiable through facial recognition
  • Bring in content your way — drag and drop, bulk upload, or replicate existing folder structures automatically
  • Structure your archive simply or to professional archival standards, with custom metadata, flexible taxonomies and hierarchical organisation
  • Control who sees what, with permissions manageable at collection, series or item level
  • Watermarking, redaction and GDPR-compliant removal request workflows are built in from day one
🖼️
Photograph
Filing cabinet
📄
Document
Shared drive
🎙️
Audio
Storage room
🎬
Video
Old laptop
📰
Publication
Archive box
📚
Yearbook
Library shelf
SocialArchive · Your Collection
🔍Search 12,847 items...
🖼️
1st XV Rugby Team, 1968
Photograph · 12 people identified
Team Photos Sports Rugby 1968
📄
Speech Day Programme, 1974
Document · OCR indexed · 24 pages
Speech Day 1974 Speech Day Programmes Events
🎙️
Patricia Osei-Bonsu · Oral History
Audio · 18:42 · Auto-transcribed
School Stories 6th Form Experiences 1995 Boarding Stories Alumni Stories
📰
School Magazine, Michaelmas 1992
Publication · 48 pages · Full text indexed
Magazine Michaelmas 1992
12,847
Items
100%
Searchable

DISCOVER

Curate your history and publish it to your community

Your archive is the source. Your portal is the destination. SocialArchive gives you the tools to curate content from your collection, build galleries and publish them to a branded community portal where the right people see exactly the right content.

Your archive
Your branded portal
People Class of 1987
Date 1985 to 1990
Location Main Hall
File type Photographs · Video
Audience Alumni
Publish Scheduled · 1 Jun 2026
→
your-school.com/alumni
New gallery
Class of 1987
Photographs and video · Main Hall · 1985 to 1990
Alumni 34 items

Your community sees a curated collection based on your selection criteria. Every gallery published on your terms, to your audience, on your schedule.

🖼️
Curated galleries, published to your portal
Build galleries from your archive across any criteria: by year, team, event, location or person. Publish them to your branded community portal in as little as three clicks.
📅
Scheduled releases and dynamic galleries
Set a publish date and time for any gallery to build anticipation and drive return visits. Dynamic galleries update automatically as new matching content is added to your archive.
🔐
Audience targeting and access control
Publish to everyone or restrict to specific groups: alumni, parents, staff or the public. Different audiences see different content from the same archive, all managed from one place.

REMEMBER

The moment your community finds itself in your history

History lives in the people who made it. SocialArchive surfaces your history to the people who lived it, and gives them the tools to add their own voices, memories and stories back into your archive.

🔍 Facial Recognition

SocialArchive automatically scans your entire archive, grouping photographs by the faces that appear in them. Name a person once and every other image containing them is tagged instantly. Community members can identify people, tag themselves and suggest names, all subject to moderation before anything is published.

👩‍🦱
👨‍🦳✓
🧑‍🦰
👨‍🦳✓
👩‍🦳
👩
👨‍🦳✓
👩‍🦲
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✦  Match found: James Hartley · identified in 4 photographs
✨ People Galleries

Every person who features in your archive gets their own gallery, generated automatically. Photographs, documents, video, audio. For community members logging in, it's often the first time they've seen themselves in your history. For others, it becomes a lasting record: staff profiles, alumni features, obituaries and more.

Sarah M. · your archive
✦ Found in 23 items
💬 Memories & Comments

Your community knows things your archive doesn't

RH
Robert Hartley · Class of 1974

"This was the last day before the old library was demolished. Mr Briggs is by the door. He taught here for 40 years."

JA
James Alderton · Class of 2004

"That's my father. I never knew this photo existed."

🔔 Robert Hartley was notified of James's reply

Community members add names, memories and context across photographs, documents, video and audio. Contributors are notified when new comments or replies are added, bringing people back into your archive again and again.

🎙️ Spoken Stories

Capture authentic voices from anywhere, at any time

Susan Edwards
Headmistress 1971–89 · 5:56
Robert Avery
Captain of Cricket, 1958 · 2:33
Joanne Smith
Careers Story, 2026 · 3:15

Invite anyone to record audio, video or written memories via a simple link. Every submission is auto-transcribed, catalogued and searchable, preserved and ready to use across fundraising, admissions, alumni engagement and more.

Learn more about Spoken Stories →
🏛️ Virtual Spaces

Reconnect your community with the places they remember

The Old Hall
🖼️ 34 photos
🎬 3 films
🎙️ 12 stories

Immersive 3D virtual tours of your historic buildings and spaces, layered with archival photographs, film, audio and personal stories. An experience no photograph alone could replicate.

Learn more about Virtual Spaces →

ACTIVATE

Preserved for a reason. Ready to be used.

  • Repurpose archive content for fundraising appeals and donor stewardship
  • Pull heritage imagery directly into marketing and admissions materials
  • Schedule and publish archive content directly to your community portal
  • Build anniversary campaigns and reunion experiences around your history
  • Generate automatic highlight videos from your collection
  • Track engagement and measure impact across every gallery and campaign
🎓 Alumni & Development
Manage and engage your alumni community
→
📣 Marketing, Admissions & Comms
Brand storytelling, social content and secure photo sharing with families
→
🎉 Reunions & Anniversaries
Anniversary campaigns, milestone events and time capsules
→
Explore all features →

The history you preserve today is the content your development team needs for their next campaign, the imagery your marketing team can't find anywhere else and the reason your alumni keep coming back.

SocialArchive makes it easy for every team in your institution to find, harness and publish archive content, without ever touching the original files.

SocialArchive · Publishing & Analytics
📅
Schedule & Publish
Plan and automate content releases to your community portal
Speech Day 1987 Scheduled ✓
🎬
Highlight Videos
Generate videos from your archive collection
📊
Engagement Analytics
Track views, shares and interactions across every gallery
Gallery views 2,847
Comments added 341
📤
Content Distribution
Make archive content available to the teams that need it
Development & Fundraising
Marketing & Admissions
Alumni Relations

GET IN TOUCH

Your history is powerful. Now it's time to use it.

Whether you're starting from scratch or digitising an existing collection, we'd love to show you what's possible. Get in touch and we'll arrange a demonstration tailored to your institution.

  • No obligation demo, tailored to your institution
  • Speak to a team member who understands your sector

COMMON QUESTIONS

Frequently asked questions

Everything you need to know about SocialArchive's archive and heritage capabilities.

SocialArchive supports physical, digital, born-digital and audiovisual records including photographs, documents, yearbooks, film, audio recordings and more. New file types and format support are added on an ongoing basis.
Yes. Rather than being built around a single standard, SocialArchive is fully customisable — you can store exactly the data you need and nothing you don't. The platform can be configured to work with any established schema or your own custom structure.
Yes. SocialArchive supports fully customisable hierarchies, which can be configured to match your specific archival structure and requirements.
Yes. SocialArchive supports custom workflows, allowing you to manage accessioning, appraisal, deaccessioning or any other process in the way that works best for your institution.
The platform can be configured to comply with specific archival standards and best practices. For many of our users, rigid adherence to formal standards is not feasible given available resources. SocialArchive is designed to work for you, whether that means full compliance or a more pragmatic approach to preservation and organisation.
Yes. SocialArchive is completely customisable. You can store all the data you want and none that you don't, with the ability to create custom fields, taxonomies and controlled vocabularies.
Yes. SocialArchive monitors file integrity and alerts specified users in the event of any anomalies.
By identifying file formats across your collection, SocialArchive can flag high-risk formats to specified users and allow batch migrations to be approved and tracked. Original files are preserved alongside migrated versions for verification purposes.
SocialArchive includes a bespoke user portal that can operate privately, publicly or in a hybrid model, giving your community a single destination to view and explore all published content.
You have complete control. Material can be uploaded, downloaded or removed at any time, individually or in bulk, without needing to contact us. Your data is always yours.
Yes. The SocialArchive portal presents content in a clean, accessible way for non-technical users, keeping detailed archival data in the background while allowing community members to easily find and explore their own history.
Yes. Archivists can publish facial recognition to allow users to find themselves and identify others in archive material. Community members can add comments at an individual item level, record their own memories in audio or video format, and submit their own content to the archive for appraisal and possible inclusion.
Most institutions are up and running within a few weeks. We recommend starting with a focused collection rather than migrating everything at once. Building your archive gradually tends to drive stronger community engagement, as there is always something new for people to discover.
Yes. SocialArchive accepts data imports in a wide range of formats, either via direct import or handled by our delivery team.
SocialArchive integrates with many major CRM systems and databases, including Raiser's Edge, Potentiality and Veracross. Whilst we do not have a published API, we can discuss integration with specific platforms. Get in touch to find out more.
Yes. SocialArchive has been designed to serve all audiences within a single platform, with a professional cataloguing environment for archivists and an accessible, intuitive portal for community members and non-technical staff.
Full user training is provided as part of the deployment process. Documentation covering all key actions is available to archive-side users on demand.
Yes. SocialArchive supports an unlimited number of user groups, ensuring the platform can always be configured to reflect the specific roles and structures within your institution.
Yes. The platform was designed with accessibility in mind and works equally well for non-technical users. Whether you want to follow formal archival standards or simply preserve your content in a way that feels manageable for your team, SocialArchive can adapt to your approach and resources.
Yes. SocialArchive is fully cloud-based. No local software installation is required. All data infrastructure is hosted in the UK.
SocialArchive can be accessed from any modern web browser with a standard internet connection. There is nothing to install.
We have a dedicated team focused on security and vulnerability testing. All content is stored on UK-based infrastructure, and we continue to develop features that keep your data safe, including alerts when new devices or applications are linked to your account.
Our helpdesk is available Monday to Friday, 09:00 to 17:00 GMT/BST, excluding English public holidays. Response times are based on issue severity, starting from a one-hour response time.
New features are continually being added. Functional updates are typically released monthly, and fixes can be deployed immediately without any disruption to your use of the platform.
SocialArchive is priced on an annual licence basis, with additional storage charged on top. We do not charge per user, so there is no penalty for growing your team or community. Get in touch for a quote tailored to your institution.

RESOURCES

Guidance & thinking

News
School Digital Archives: The Complete Guide
School Digital Archives: The Complete Guide

Most schools are sitting on decades of photographs, publications and records that are at risk of being lost. This guide covers everything you need to know about building a school digital archive, from choosing the right approach, to using your history to reconnect alumni, support fundraising and make the most of a milestone anniversary.

How to Start a Digital Archive at Your School (Without an Archivist)
How to Start a Digital Archive at Your School (Without an Archivist)

Starting a digital archive doesn’t require an archivist, a perfect system or a major project. This practical guide explains how schools can begin small, capture meaningful stories, and build a sustainable digital archive that supports engagement, storytelling and long-term continuity.

The Early 2000s Memory Gap: Why Schools and Universities Need to Collect These Stories Now
The Early 2000s Memory Gap: Why Schools and Universities Need to Collect These Stories Now

The early 2000s represent a critical, and often overlooked, gap in many institutional archives. While this period marked the first wave of mass digital photography, fragile storage methods, obsolete technology and fragmented platforms have left many schools and universities with surprisingly little material from these years.

This article explores why early 2000s memories are at risk, why now is the right time to collect them, and how schools and universities can run effective memory campaigns.