Jostens launches Yearbook+ virtual experience

Jostens launched Yearbook+ (“Yearbook Plus”), a personalized virtual experience allowing students to add their own digital photos and content to the traditionally curated and printed yearbook, the company said in a press release. The new digital offering will be made available to Jostens yearbook customers this school year.

“Jostens has been the leader in delivering technology to yearbooks since our first on-line layout tool in the early 2000’s, which literally brought yearbooks into the digital age,” said Tammy Whitaker, vice president and general manager, Yearbook division.  “Yearbook+ takes our digital innovation to the next level by adding aspects of both individuality and inclusivity that can not only make the yearbook better, but a school’s culture and community better.”

“Yearbook+ helps yearbook staffs create a real sense of belonging in the yearbook, while giving each student the power to really tell their own story and express a greater sense of individuality than ever before,” said Mike Wolf, Jostens Vice President of Yearbook marketing.

All students are invited to upload 10 photos of their school year; those photos are then digitally “unlocked” by scanning each student’s portrait picture in the printed yearbook with their mobile device. Yearbook+ requires no downloading to a device.

“As a yearbook adviser, I appreciate the inclusion of our many student voices and perspectives in the yearbook,” said Jason Bowen, yearbook adviser at California’s Vista Murrieta High School.  “Jostens Yearbook+ will allow every student the opportunity to personalize their own yearbook experience, and the entire school community will benefit from this better, more inclusive yearbook.”

Yearbook+ is the latest effort in Jostens’ efforts to make yearbooks more digital. Earlier this year, Jostens debuted Digital Signing Pages and a series of virtual yearbook workshops to help preserve yearbook traditions in the face of COVID-19 challenges.

“While it wasn’t developed in response to COVID-19, Yearbook+ is going to give all students, regardless of their location or learning environment, a chance to tell their own story in this historic year,” said Whitaker.  “This is a year none of us will forget, and Yearbook+ will allow every student to remember it in their own way.”