How Ferris State University uses Stockpress Digital Asset Management (DAM) to help students and faculty organize, share, and use media faster.
Company: Ferris State University
Industry: Higher education
Location: Big Rapids, Michigan, USA
About Ferris State University
Ferris State University is a public university in Big Rapids, Michigan, serving students across a wide range of disciplines and professional programs. Within its Television & Digital Media Production program, students regularly create and manage digital content as part of hands-on learning, studio production, and social media promotion.
For Andrew Tingley, Assistant Professor of Television & Digital Media Production, digital assets play a central role in both teaching and recruitment. From studio photography and student-created content to program promotion and social media publishing, the department needs a practical way to organize, access, and share media quickly across multiple users.
As the volume of photos and promotional content grew, the need for a true Digital Asset Management (DAM) platform became increasingly important — not only to support the department’s day-to-day workflow, but also to give students experience using the kind of professional tools they may encounter in their future careers.
The challenge:
Before Stockpress, Ferris State University relied on a mix of OneDrive, traditional website uploads, and manual sharing processes to manage photos and other digital assets.
Over time, that created several challenges:
- Assets had to pass through one person before they became available to others
- Students could not easily self-serve the files they needed
- Uploading and sharing content created bottlenecks
- Time-sensitive social content could be delayed by hours or even until the next day
- Students were learning about DAM in theory, but not using a real DAM platform in practice
- Many DAM options on the market were too expensive for a university department to adopt
Without a central, easy-to-use system, managing classroom and promotional content felt clunky. Files were harder to access, collaboration was slower, and the workflow depended too heavily on one person being available at the right moment.
The solution:
Stockpress gave Ferris State University a professional yet affordable DAM platform that students and faculty could start using right away.
Andrew adopted Stockpress with several key priorities in mind:
- Easy onboarding for students: New users could be added each semester and get started quickly.
- Multi-user access: Students could upload and use assets directly, without everything passing through one person.
- Collections for organized workflows: Photos from different studio productions could be grouped clearly by show and date.
- Searchability and metadata: Assets could be tagged and found quickly, with future plans to use metadata more deeply.
- Affordable entry point: The free tier made it possible to get started immediately and build confidence before upgrading.
The platform was easy to implement in a classroom setting, even with new groups of students joining each semester. Once students were invited, they could create their own secure logins and begin uploading and using assets with minimal training.
As the department’s use of Stockpress expanded, Andrew was also able to bring in other professors and begin using the platform beyond the classroom — creating a shared home for program photography, building images, and promotional media.
“The bar to entry with Stockpress is super low and super easy to get started.”
– Andrew Tingley, Assistant Professor, Ferris State University
Results:
With Stockpress, Ferris State University now has:
- Faster access to classroom content: Students can upload photos quickly and make them available to others right away.
- Less bottlenecking: Files no longer need to wait on one person to manually upload and distribute them.
- More practical, real-world teaching: Students are learning with a professional DAM platform, not just hearing about one in theory.
- Better organization for recurring productions: Collections make it easier to manage media across studio shows and semesters.
- More collaborative workflows: Faculty and students can contribute to and access shared assets in one place.
- A stronger foundation for future metadata use: The department can build a richer media archive over time for reuse and faster promotion.
“It was really easy. The students logged on, created their own unique password, and we were able to get everybody creating and using the assets right away.”
– Andrew Tingley, Assistant Professor, Ferris State University
Q&A with Andrew Tingley
Interviewee: Andrew Tingley, Assistant Professor, Television & Digital Media Production, Ferris State University
Interviewer: Veronica, Customer Marketing — Stockpress
Introduction
When digital content is part of both the classroom experience and the public-facing promotion of a university program, speed and organization matter.
For Andrew Tingley, Assistant Professor of Television & Digital Media Production at Ferris State University, that means more than simply storing files. It means helping students collaborate, giving faculty shared access to media, and making sure useful content is available when it is needed.
In this conversation, Andrew shares how Stockpress helped move the department away from clunky file-sharing methods and toward a more professional, collaborative Digital Asset Management workflow.
“We needed something real.”
Veronica (Stockpress): Can you tell us about your role and the types of digital assets you manage?
Andrew: I’m a professor at Ferris State University. I teach five classes right now, and one of my responsibilities is maintaining our social media presence online as we recruit and try to get new students.
The digital asset management need is really twofold. As program coordinator for television and digital media, I maintain our social media presence and need to manage assets for regular posting. But I also teach a class called Online Media Management, where students take a lot of photos during studio show production and need to share those photos quickly so they can create content for multiple platforms.
“Before Stockpress, it was clunky.”
Veronica: What were you using before Stockpress?
Andrew: Before we started using Stockpress, we really weren’t using a DAM at all. I had been teaching students about digital asset management platforms, but at the end of the lecture I would usually have to say, “We don’t use any of those tools right now.”
We were using OneDrive and uploading photos to a traditional website, and that process had to pass through me. It wasn’t easy to get additional logins for students, and overall it felt very clunky.
“Everything had to pass through too many hands.”
Veronica: What were the biggest challenges with that setup?
Andrew: One of the biggest challenges was how many people or steps the files had to pass through before getting to the end user — in this case, the students creating social media posts.
That created a bottleneck. If students took photos one afternoon and sent them to me, but I was in class for a few hours, maybe those files wouldn’t get uploaded until the next day. That slowed everything down.
“Most other options were unaffordable.”
Veronica: What were you hoping to improve when you started looking for a new solution?
Andrew: I was looking for a digital asset management platform that felt real — something where you could upload assets, create multiple users, organize media, and add tags and metadata so you could search and find things quickly.
The problem was that most of the platforms I found were unaffordable. I would see “contact us for a quote,” and then I’d reach out and find out it cost thousands and thousands of dollars. Stockpress stood out because it had a free tier, so we could get students started right away and begin using a real DAM platform.
“It took me years to find the right fit.”
Veronica: What initially drew you to Stockpress?
Andrew: Honestly, I can’t remember exactly how I came across it. It was probably through years of searching and researching DAM platforms online. After three or four years of looking, I found Stockpress and noticed that it had a free tier that I could get started with right away.
That made a huge difference, because I could finally get students using a real digital asset management platform rather than just talking about one.
“Onboarding was very, very easy.”
Veronica: What was implementation like?
Andrew: It was very easy. Every semester I’m bringing in a new group of students, so I need something that works repeatedly. I signed students up for accounts, they created their own unique passwords, and we were up and running quickly.
I remember one issue during a later semester when I was adding new users, and Stockpress responded right away through the contact form and helped me solve it during class. That let us keep moving without disruption.
“Students could use it right away.”
Veronica: How long did it take for your team to get comfortable with the platform?
Andrew: Very quickly. Because I’m working with new students every semester, it really needs to be intuitive. I introduce digital asset management in class, then I show them the collections, explain where they should upload photos from each production, and they get started right away.
Some software has a real learning curve. Stockpress didn’t. It was very easy for students to understand and use.
“We’re now thinking more about metadata.”
Veronica: How are you thinking about using Stockpress going forward?
Andrew: The next stage for us is using metadata more deeply. For example, if a guest appears on one of our recurring shows, we want to be able to go back and see if we already have a photo we can use again.
That means tagging details that help us search more effectively later. The more we build that up over time, the more useful the collection becomes.
“The support has been great.”
Veronica: How has your experience been with the Stockpress team?
Andrew: Customer service at Stockpress has been great. Anytime I’ve had a problem, I’ve clicked the chat and usually gotten a response right away.
I’ve also had bigger conversations about how to take the next step, pay for the platform, and get more functionality and storage. In those cases, the team responded the same day and worked through it with me. It felt affordable and realistic for us at the university level.
“Now students can upload and use files right away.”
Veronica: How has your workflow changed since using Stockpress?
Andrew: In the old days, things were clunky and folders would get disorganized. Now, because every student has their own login, they can go shoot photos during one of our studio shows and upload them right away.
Once the files are in Stockpress, they’re immediately available to the rest of the students in that collection. That means people can start working much faster — sometimes even before class starts.
“It’s easy, flexible media management.”
Veronica: If you had to describe Stockpress in three words, what would they be?
Andrew: Easy, flexible media management.
“It’s a great fit for small teams and content creators.”
Veronica: Who do you think Stockpress is best suited for?
Andrew: Before becoming a professor, I had a small video production company, and if we’d had something like Stockpress, it would’ve been a godsend.
I’d recommend it to any small business or organization looking to share assets and keep them organized — agencies, marketing teams, content creators, or even businesses working with outside marketing support. It makes the whole workflow of getting content out much, much faster.
What This Means for Education and Content Programs
Andrew’s experience reflects a common challenge in education and content-driven environments:
- Media is being created constantly
- Students and staff need access at the same time
- Traditional file-sharing tools create bottlenecks
- Teaching professional workflows matters just as much as teaching production skills
- Budget constraints can make most DAM platforms unrealistic
For Ferris State University, Stockpress delivered:
- A professional DAM students can actually use
- Faster media sharing across classes and productions
- Simple onboarding for new users each semester
- Shared access for faculty and students
- An affordable path from free use to wider departmental adoption
Most importantly, it helped turn digital asset management from a classroom concept into a practical, everyday workflow.
“You can start today, and it’s still a professional tool.”
Andrew’s perspective is simple: Stockpress lowers the barrier to getting started without lowering the quality of the experience.
For Ferris State University, that means students can learn on a real DAM platform, faculty can work more collaboratively, and the department can manage media in a way that feels faster, easier, and more future-ready.
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