Love it or hate it, Schoology is here to stay. The 2016-17 school year marks the year Shanghai American School leaves behind Moodle and part of Powerschool for a new system known as Schoology. This swift transition did not come without annoying bumps in the road, but Schoology also brings a number of features that its predecessors did not have.
“We have maybe 50 plus systems we’re using in this school, both Puxi and Pudong,” said Ms. Arlette Pimentel, the Student Database and Information Manager. “We just want everything to be in one platform, so that’s why we shifted to Schoology.”
Schoology has received mixed reviews from the SAS community. Many teachers were understandably frustrated when they were unable to post grades in the beginning of the first semester, as administrators were still trying to sort of last semester’s grades, with seniors’ university transcripts pending to be sent off. Teachers were able to begin posting grades on Schoology again a few weeks ago.
“This is something I’ve seen over and over again at SAS,” Ms. Pat Cessna said, “We start something new and we jump into it before all the bugs have been worked out. It would’ve made more sense to have one or two teachers using Schoology this year to get all the bugs worked out and then roll it out next year. During this current school year, teachers could’ve been trained in what's to come, instead of having it all thrown at us the first week of school.”
Teachers only received training before the students arrived, according to Ms. Pimentel. However, there were multiple “pioneer teachers” in both Puxi and Pudong who began using Schoology last year before SAS decided to go with Schoology for sure. She believes most of the early teachers liked Schoology; nevertheless, the school encountered some unexpected problems when Schoology was applied to all the classrooms this year, which had different ways of learning.
Ms. Pimentel said that the process will be different for semester two and the same problems should not happen again, as they learned from their mistakes in the transition process. Within the next three to five years, the school will still be using both Schoology and Powerschool. Schoology as a learning management system (LMS) and Powerschool as a student information system (SIS). Classroom activities and the gradebook will be in Schoology while Powerschool will hold students’ personal information, demographics of the SAS families, report cards, and various sign-ups.
“I don’t like Schoology,” high school senior Eugenia Lee said, “It’s very inconvenient and I think Moodle is better. It’s uncomfortable to look at your grades, because it’s all separate so you can’t see holistically what all your grades look like. Schoology is also just very slow without VPN.”
The separation of grades for different classes appears to be a common complaint. However, some students also had positive responses to Schoology. Ms. Pimentel describes Schoology as the “Facebook of education” in the “school universe,” and her sentiment was also echoed in the student body.
“I think it’s pretty convenient how students can directly message their teachers,” senior Nicole Yin said. “A lot of the times, when you email your teachers, they don’t check their emails all the time, but Schoology is like a Facebook kind thing.”
Some teachers also like Schoology because it integrated Moodle and Turnitin.com into one. They can have their students do work within Schoology. The adjustment may have also been easier for freshmen who were going through a major transition anyway and did not have to shift from Moodle to Schoology for classes in high school.
“I think [Schoology] is decent, because it’s easy to access the grades, upcoming assignments, and materials [in one place],” freshman Heather Lu said. “Sometimes it doesn’t load and is laggy, but I think it is better than both [Moodle and Powerschool]. Schoology has more features, like the messages and the upcoming assignments. They help you remember the homework.”
Beyond these features, Schoology has more features that are waiting to be integrated into the SAS community, notably the profiles and blogs. They already exist in Schoology; students and teachers just need to be taught how to use it once the school becomes more comfortable with Schoology.
“If you have an essay or a project that you submitted online and you want to add it on your porfolio, you can add all of them there,” Ms. Pimentel said, “You can put it on your blogs, because right now Schoology is not just our school. It’s like the school universe, like Facebook for education. You can put the best projects you have in your portfolio and [use] it when applying for university.”
As students and teachers continue to deal with Schoology’s lags and inconvenient grades, they may also remain hopeful for the potential that Schoology brings to the table.
Emma Li
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| Screenshot from the Schoology website clarifying the sometimes varying pronunciation. Source |
Schoology has received mixed reviews from the SAS community. Many teachers were understandably frustrated when they were unable to post grades in the beginning of the first semester, as administrators were still trying to sort of last semester’s grades, with seniors’ university transcripts pending to be sent off. Teachers were able to begin posting grades on Schoology again a few weeks ago.
“This is something I’ve seen over and over again at SAS,” Ms. Pat Cessna said, “We start something new and we jump into it before all the bugs have been worked out. It would’ve made more sense to have one or two teachers using Schoology this year to get all the bugs worked out and then roll it out next year. During this current school year, teachers could’ve been trained in what's to come, instead of having it all thrown at us the first week of school.”
Teachers only received training before the students arrived, according to Ms. Pimentel. However, there were multiple “pioneer teachers” in both Puxi and Pudong who began using Schoology last year before SAS decided to go with Schoology for sure. She believes most of the early teachers liked Schoology; nevertheless, the school encountered some unexpected problems when Schoology was applied to all the classrooms this year, which had different ways of learning.
Ms. Pimentel said that the process will be different for semester two and the same problems should not happen again, as they learned from their mistakes in the transition process. Within the next three to five years, the school will still be using both Schoology and Powerschool. Schoology as a learning management system (LMS) and Powerschool as a student information system (SIS). Classroom activities and the gradebook will be in Schoology while Powerschool will hold students’ personal information, demographics of the SAS families, report cards, and various sign-ups.
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| Some students experience slow loading times on the site |
“I think it’s pretty convenient how students can directly message their teachers,” senior Nicole Yin said. “A lot of the times, when you email your teachers, they don’t check their emails all the time, but Schoology is like a Facebook kind thing.”
Some teachers also like Schoology because it integrated Moodle and Turnitin.com into one. They can have their students do work within Schoology. The adjustment may have also been easier for freshmen who were going through a major transition anyway and did not have to shift from Moodle to Schoology for classes in high school.
“I think [Schoology] is decent, because it’s easy to access the grades, upcoming assignments, and materials [in one place],” freshman Heather Lu said. “Sometimes it doesn’t load and is laggy, but I think it is better than both [Moodle and Powerschool]. Schoology has more features, like the messages and the upcoming assignments. They help you remember the homework.”
Beyond these features, Schoology has more features that are waiting to be integrated into the SAS community, notably the profiles and blogs. They already exist in Schoology; students and teachers just need to be taught how to use it once the school becomes more comfortable with Schoology.
“If you have an essay or a project that you submitted online and you want to add it on your porfolio, you can add all of them there,” Ms. Pimentel said, “You can put it on your blogs, because right now Schoology is not just our school. It’s like the school universe, like Facebook for education. You can put the best projects you have in your portfolio and [use] it when applying for university.”
Emma Li