10 Best Ways to Engage Your Alumni this Christmas
Summary: The festive season is one of the best times to reconnect with your alumni community. Christmas naturally sparks nostalgia…memories of school concerts, nativity plays, and end-of-term traditions, making it the perfect opportunity to reawaken emotional ties and create lasting engagement. From personalised digital Christmas cards and online galleries to festive fundraising ideas and digital advent calendars, this article shares 10 creative ways to engage your alumni this Christmas.
It may still be early, but before you know it, the end of term will be approaching, and with it, the mad run-up to Christmas! It’s a busy time of year, which is why we thought we’d get this out early to give you plenty of time to plan a few festive ideas to engage your community this Christmas!
The holidays are naturally nostalgic; they bring people back to memories of their school days, friends, teachers, and traditions. Ever sat in your child’s nativity and found yourself thinking back to your own school production? December is the perfect time to reawaken those emotional ties and create moments of genuine connection.
Here are our top 10 creative and meaningful ways to engage your alumni in the lead-up to Christmas!
1. Send Personalised Digital Christmas Cards
Forget generic cards… this year, make every message personal!
With SocialArchive’s facial recognition, schools can automatically identify faces in photos, allowing you to generate bespoke Christmas cards for every member of your community using images from your digital archive.
Imagine receiving a festive greeting featuring a photo of yourself in your school’s Christmas production! You can even let recipients download or share their personalised card directly to social media. It’s a great way to reconnect with alumni who might not yet be part of your current database.
💡 Tip: Include a short call-to-action, such as “Update your contact details for next year’s Christmas message,” to keep your records fresh for the new year.
2. Gift a Personalised Online Gallery
One of the most popular features of SocialArchive is the personalised online gallery, which updates dynamically. Every time new content featuring an individual is added to your archive, their personal gallery refreshes automatically, including every photo of them across the years. What a gift for Christmas!
These galleries are accessible anytime and can be viewed as a slideshow or turned into a video complete with music.
If you’re short on content, why not invite alumni to submit their own photos from school Christmas plays, carol concerts, or house competitions? The more contributions you gather, the richer your archive and the more personal value it offers your community.
💬 “Mum, look that’s me as the third shepherd in 1998!”
It’s a fun, interactive way to celebrate your shared history while giving something truly personal back to your alumni.
3. Host a Virtual Festive Reunion
Not everyone can make it back to campus for an end-of-year gathering, but that doesn’t mean they can’t reconnect.
Host a virtual festive reunion through Zoom or your alumni platform, featuring a mix of live interviews, archive footage, and festive trivia. You could even turn it into a lighthearted fundraising opportunity.
With SocialArchive, you can curate video highlights from your archive, such as clips from old nativity plays or winter concerts, and play them as part of the event. You might even include a “Guess the Year” round featuring old photos!
4. Share a ‘12 Days of Christmas’ Memory Series
Launch a short campaign on your website or social channels counting down to Christmas with daily archive posts. Each day could feature:
A vintage photo or video from a past Christmas celebration
A fun fact or memory from an alumnus
A small thank-you message or seasonal update
This drip-feed of nostalgia keeps your alumni community engaged and looking forward to the next day’s post without demanding too much of their attention at a busy time of year.
Using SocialArchive’s scheduling and tagging features, you can easily queue up themed content and tag it by year, event, or department, creating mini-campaigns that appeal to specific audiences (like choir alumni, sports teams, or staff).
5. Run a ‘Gift of Giving’ Campaign
The Christmas season is also the season of giving. Encourage alumni to give back through a festive fundraising campaign, whether for bursaries, new facilities, or your annual appeal.
Make it feel personal by tying donations to specific memories:
“Give £20.04 to celebrate the Class of 2004”
Send a tailored email to that cohort featuring photos, videos, or event highlights from their school years. Find out more here about how a ‘blast from the past’ can fuel alumni giving.
“Sponsor a bauble on the virtual Christmas tree”
Each donation lights up a digital bauble, allowing donors to include their name or a short festive message. Watch the tree grow brighter as your community comes together.
“Name That Carol” Challenge
Host a lighthearted online Christmas quiz using archive clips from school carol concerts and festive performances. Alumni make a small donation to enter, and each round features a throwback moment from your archive. The mix of competition, nostalgia, and fun can be surprisingly effective for engagement, especially if there’s a small prize or recognition for the winner!
6. Share Alumni Christmas Stories
There’s something special about hearing how far your alumni have come, especially when tied to a shared festive theme. Invite former students to share their memories of school Christmas events, or how those experiences shaped their future paths.
With SocialArchive’s Spoken Stories feature, you can easily capture these audio or video memories from alumni around the world. Display them in your online archive or use SocialArchive’s video creation tools to weave them together into a heart-warming “Christmas Voices” film to share across your channels.
💡 Try prompts like:
“What’s one Christmas memory from school that’s stuck with you?”
“Did you ever sneak a mince pie before the carol concert?”
These short, authentic moments make wonderful festive content, and they can be repurposed as evergreen stories to inspire your community for years to come.
7. Launch a Digital Advent Calendar
Who says Advent calendars are just for chocolate? Create a digital version with 24 days of memories, mini competitions, or alumni spotlights.
Each day could reveal:
A photo or video from the archives
A short quote from an alumnus
A festive message from a staff member
SocialArchive’s archive management system makes it easy to pull images, videos, and stories from across your collection, so every day’s reveal feels fresh and surprising. You can even schedule each post in advance, saving valuable admin time during the busiest season of the year.
It’s a simple, feel-good campaign that keeps your alumni coming back daily and builds excitement right up to Christmas Eve.
8. Host a ‘Back to School for Christmas’ Challenge
Invite alumni to relive their school days in a light-hearted way. Think quizzes like “Can you still sing your school hymn?” or “How well do you remember your teachers’ catchphrases?”
Use archive photos or yearbook images from SocialArchive as quiz visuals and host the challenge through your alumni network or social media.
🏆 Offer small prizes for winners, like a branded mug, or a digital “Hall of Fame” feature in your next newsletter.
This kind of interactive nostalgia sparks conversation and drives engagement across all generation and platforms (the Meta algorithm loves user engagement).
9. Celebrate Your Community with a Year-in-Review Video
Before the year closes, gather highlights from your events, alumni achievements, and archive discoveries into a beautifully produced end-of-year video.
With SocialArchive’s video creation tool, you can automatically generate a shareable montage using tagged photos, video clips, and even snippets from your Christmas campaigns.
Add a festive soundtrack, captions, and a thank-you message from your Head or Principal and share it as a “Happy Christmas from all of us” send-off.
10. Invite Alumni to Add to Your Archive
Finally, Christmas is the perfect moment to encourage alumni to give back a memory.
Ask your community to dig out photos, programmes, or footage from Christmas events gone by and upload them directly into your digital archive.
With SocialArchive, this process is simple: alumni can upload materials through the platform, while your team retains full control thanks to a built-in approval process. You could even feature a “Memory of the Week” on your alumni site or newsletter, showcasing newly shared content.
It’s a wonderful way to grow your archive, celebrate your shared history, and give alumni the joy of contributing something lasting to their community’s story.
Wrapping Up 🎁
Christmas is the perfect chance to remind your alumni why they’re proud to be part of your community. With tools like SocialArchive, you can transform traditional outreach into personalised, interactive, and shareable experiences that bring your history to life.
Whether it’s a nostalgic video montage, a heartfelt personalised Christmas card, or a digital gallery of school memories, these small touches help alumni feel remembered, valued and connected, no matter how long it’s been since they last stepped through your doors.
So, this December, go beyond the standard Christmas newsletter and celebrate your shared story. Because the memories you preserve today are the ones that will keep your community together for years to come.
Ready to make your archive come alive this Christmas?
Discover how SocialArchive can help you create personalised, shareable festive experiences for your alumni community. Contact us today or book a demo to find out more.
Key Takeaways:
Start your Christmas planning early to give your alumni engagement ideas time to shine.
The festive season is the perfect moment to tap into nostalgia and shared memories.
Personalised experiences make alumni feel valued and connected.
Interactive campaigns like virtual reunions or digital advent calendars boost ongoing engagement.
Nostalgia-driven fundraising connects emotion with lasting impact.
Every festive idea is a chance to grow your archive and strengthen your community ties.
FAQs:
What are the best ideas to engage my alumni this Christmas?
Some of the most effective festive engagement ideas include sending personalised digital Christmas cards, creating online galleries or video slideshows, hosting virtual reunions, and running nostalgia-driven fundraising campaigns. You can also try interactive ideas like a digital advent calendar or a ‘Gift a Memory’ upload drive to grow your archive. Platforms like SocialArchive® make it easy to bring these ideas to life by connecting your content, community, and creativity in one place.
Why is Christmas a good time to engage alumni?
Christmas naturally evokes nostalgia and connection. It’s a time when alumni reflect on their school memories and traditions, making them more receptive to personal, community-driven communication and fundraising.
How can SocialArchive help with alumni engagement during the holidays?
SocialArchive enables schools and universities to create personalised festive experiences: from custom Christmas cards using facial recognition, to dynamic online galleries, video storytelling, and interactive campaigns that strengthen relationships and inspire giving.
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