Digitising University Archive
Over the past few weeks, we have been working on digitising staff newsletters from our University Archive including Pipeline, Norion, and The Londinian. It’s been one of those projects where you sit down planning to scan a few issues, and suddenly you’re lost in the stories, the photos, and the history of our university.
There’s something really special about holding these physical copies before they go digital. The paper is a little worn, the design is very 'of its time', and the headlines feel like a step back in time. Even though we’re almost fifty years ahead, the themes of celebrating achievements, sharing challenges and keeping the community connected, still feel familiar.
Pipeline, Issue 23, Jun 1981 (ref. UA/PNL/17/845)
One of my favourite discoveries in the archive was about 'study service', a form of community work tied to students’ courses. By the early 1980s hundreds of universities, polytechnics, and colleges were running projects that connected students’ skills directly to local needs.
At Polytechnic of North London (PNL) students were working with residents on playgrounds and leisure spaces, architecture students were helping redevelop Finchley (their proposals were even viewed by Margaret Thatcher, who was MP there at the time), and Home Economics students were out interviewing schools for a report on community service. One student even set up her own action group in Hackney.
The projects were often small, but that was their power. They filled gaps in social support service, for example, working with community groups on murals in bomb damaged Belfast estates, which gave students a chance to learn by doing or, as UNESCO put it at the time, “learning in the bush.”
What I love most is how in these stories, PNL becomes a hub of energy, where study was inseparable from social action.
Pipeline, Issue 26, Dec 1981 (ref. UA/PNL/17/854)
One of the stories in the December 1981 issue of Pipeline highlights the efforts being made to better serve London’s Chinese community through public libraries. A meeting brought together over fifty librarians from across the country alongside representatives from the Hong Kong Government Office, the Chinese newspaper Sing Tao and academics from London to discuss how to provide Chinese language books and resources. The project revealed just how vital access to Chinese literature was for families scattered across the UK.
As one participant put it simply and powerfully: “I hope to see every library in London providing Chinese books and children’s literature.”
Why Digitise?
Projects like this aren’t just about preserving paper. They’re about making sure these stories remain accessible to staff who remember them, to students curious about the past, and to researchers piecing together how London Metropolitan University evolved. Every scan is another piece of our shared history kept alive.
For me, the process has been more than just technical work. It’s been a chance to hold something from decades ago, think about how much has changed (and how much hasn’t), and to imagine the people who once opened these newsletters hot off the press.
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