QR Codes In CAT’s Yearbook

As people get more used to QR Codes, even MORE people are coming up with new ways to make a book, a magazine, a flyer, a web page, a blog or even a business card more interactive. I mean, this is what bridging the divide between the online and offline world is all about! Incredibly inspiring.

More so now that some students of The Center for the Arts and Technology (CAT) in Phoenixville PA came up with the idea of making their yearbook more interesting. You know how the yearbook is often published ahead of time, before the year comes to a big end? And then there is nothing at all in the yearbook that showcases the events that followed. The end of the year party, the party you threw for your favorite teacher who was moving away to another town or state. The ball you guys had at the final day of school. The yearbook dedication and not forgetting the award ceremonies which SHOULD be in the yearbook.

The students at CAT changed all of that…if every other school, college and university followed suit.

The students took it upon themselves to come up with an interactive media page on the internet that puts the spotlight on four year-end events that never got a spot in the yearbook. The prom, the senior awards banquet, the yearbook dedication ceremony and the end-of-the-year graduation ceremony. So, with the interactive media page, class of 2011, thirty years down the road, will still see (hopefully) the photos, videos, comments, etc.

The students thought that it was more common for the students to compile DVDs and print after-event photos in the past year, why not give the other students another option. Yes, they can go ahead and purchase the DVDs if they liked but if they didn’t want to, they don’t lose out. That is because, there will be QR Codes printed on the yearbook and it will lead to the interactive media page. QR codes, for those of you who are still in the dark about it, are like hyperlinks in the real world that resolves to online content (in the nutshell).

A representative said that there are even more ways to make use of QR Code in a yearbook but he will leave it all in the hands of class of 2012, hoping that overusing QR Code is not advisable.

Sage advice.