Ideas to Action: Building a Digital Archive of School Memorabilia

By Beth Hennes, Library Media & Technology Specialist at Madison West High School

Madison West High School opened its doors in 1930 and is currently undergoing a massive renovation. In the process of packing and moving, we have discovered so many interesting artifacts from West and also Madison’s history. For example, West must have become the repository of some items from Madison Central High School when it closed in the 1960s. We even discovered items from Madison High School, dating back to the turn of the century. It became very clear that we had some preservation efforts to pursue, and now our digital archive project is well under way!

So far, we have digitized all of the Madison West yearbooks that we had copies of (we are still missing a few, especially pre-1970, so please contact us if you encounter one that we can keep or borrow!) Thanks to WiLS’ help, we were also able to launch our digital archive platform, hosted by Advantage Archives, and digitize the bound copies of our student newspaper, The West High Times, from 1930-1962. We are working on branding and customizing the digital archive website, so it is not quite live yet. We are currently scanning boxes of alumni memorabilia donations so that we can return them to their original owners’ families.

This has been a collaborative effort between our school librarian, a social studies teacher, an assistant principal, and a couple of students who are earning credit through an independent study. When West’s renovation is complete, we would like to feature an interactive display in our Welcome Center for guests to explore while they wait. Our dreams for this project are to find a sustainable place in our curriculum, perhaps as part of a course treating local history, where our students are actively exploring and expanding the contents of our digital archive.