Schoology Reviews

Pros

This is hands-down my go-to LMS for education. Having used a variety of LMS programs out there, and having come from some such as Google Classroom, and 3DGameLab, Schoology is top notch. Constantly being updated, Schoology helps transition the focus from the teacher to the student. The best features are Schoology's ability to integrate with other tools, as teachers can embed edtech tools such as Padlet, Polleverywhere, Thinglink, etc into a Schoology assignment using their LTI integration. As they continue to partner with other edtech companies, some of these then become options within their platform. I have used their integrated Conferences, Lock Down Browser, and more. The ability to transition ownership to the students, monitor their work while letting them work at their own pace is truly remarkable and a game-changer in education.

Cons

There are some things I wish were available such as the ability to share an entire folder of contents with an individual student, or to set separate completion rules/dates for assignments within a folder. Not sure why these aren't options. I also think a way to automatically award badges upon completion would really help teachers cut down on time awarding them.

Pros

Once you get the hang of it, it's pretty easy to create quizzes using Google Forms and upload them into Schoology as an assignment. You can also directly create an assignment in Schoology itself which is pretty easy to do. I frequently create math tests on here, because it is so easy and has different options like multiple choice, sequencing, etc.

Cons

I had to take an initial training course to understand this software better. There are a few confusing buttons when creating an assignment - but after a few tries, you get used to it. (I would recommend watching some YouTube videos about how to use Schoology if you're interested in buying this software for your school. They have some very helpful ones on there.)

Pros

Easy to use, it made classroom management better.

Cons

The ability to printout assessments was lacking.

Pros

Nothing. Don't know why the administration purchased it. It was not worth the money. Most parents we know can't find anything in there and need multiple trainings.

Cons

Too many features, too many folders, trying to find anything on there is like looking for a needle in a haystack. iI is not intuitive at all - this company needs some apple developers on their staff. Fails to facilitate the most common uses for parents and students, with a focus on easy grade reporting and ease of accessing current assignments and the instructions from the teacher. I can't find anything in here. No parents I know like this software.

Pros

I loved being able to assign and see student progress. We also had the option of deciding what needed to be teacher graded. My favorite feature of all was that it automatically integrated and synced with PowerSchool.

Cons

It took some time to get used to adding standards and just using it, but after that I don’t feel like there was anything negative.

Pros

I have been using Schoology for approximately five years now and I find it to be the easiest LMS with the most features of all the other ones I’ve tried. It is so easy to organize in whatever way is most convenient for you and your course. It supports video uploads from multiple different kinds of sources whether be YouTube or Loom or Edpuzzle. Students love the use of badges where teachers can send “gold star” encouragement to students like “most improved” or other distinctions. Students can easily email their teachers through Schoology. Course updates allow for whole class communication. The pro list goes on and on.

Cons

The biggest con I have experienced occasionally rears its head when I try to sync Schoology to PowerSchool. I find that some assignments will not sync. Even after I go through all of the usual troubleshooting details such as having a due date or the assignment title being too long, nothing will get it to sync. This is not a huge problem maybe one assignment and 50. What is frustrating, is that when you go into the sync page the error listed doesn’t tell you what to look for us just simply says “failed the sync.

Another frustration I have is when I want to unpublished material to students In Schoology that unpublished material is then unpublished in PowerSchool. Just because I want to on publish it in Schoology does it mean I want their grades in assignments to be unseen in PowerSchool.

Pros

I love that I can login once and be able to access a variety of programs and software. The one user login is awesome! I like that I can send out messages to students either through the messenger feature or by placing an announcement in each class. I also like being able to go directly from one website (for example Newsela) to another (for example Nearpod) with in the platform itself. Set up classes is a breeze, and I appreciate how seamless Schoology has made it for teachers. The training I received from Schoology staff is also very good.

Cons

As with any LMS, there is a learning curve, but it ranks as one of the better LMSs in terms of easy of use. I would like to see Zoom integrated directly into each class, as an additional option.

Pros

Schoology is very intuitive for teachers, students and parents providing an easy to use learning management system for all.

Cons

Using the free, non-enterprise, version doesn't provide teachers with student access analytics.

Pros

I absolutely love the gradebook and it is so east to use. Grading the project and watching it automatically upload to the gradebook saves sooo much time.

Cons

I hate the uploading feature. It makes you jump through too many screens to upload a document. On the teacher side I do not like the missed assignments tally. When you click on a resubmitted assignment for example it never takes you straight to what was resubmitted. It will take you to the overall assignment and then I have to guess which student resubmitted it.

Pros

Our district uses Schoology as a district-wide Learning Management System (LMS). We switched to Schoology last year and I use Schoology for almost all of my course work. I teach using the flipped classroom model and Schoology's platform allows me to share my lecture videos, conduct assessments of student knowledge and understanding, give assignments, and to provide communication with students and parents. All of my content is available to my students through Schoology 24/7, I can make it available in a variety of ways, and I can make updates in real-time.

Schoology's introduction of the Google Assignment App has me excited about our switch to Chromebooks. This app allows you to attach a Google Doc (say a study guide) as part of an assignment. When students open the assignment the document is copied, renamed, and added to their Google Drive. No more students opening or copying a new version of the document each time they go back to the assignment instead of to the copy they made but didn't actually rename as the directions stated. The document is 'tied' to the assignment and updates no matter where they work on it from (inside the assignment or through their Google Drive.) I also use the platform’s completion rules to give students autonomy while also keeping them on track.

Another great option is the ability to add images to pages, updates, announcements, and folders to give visual information, help guide students, and give them access options. I also am able to hyperlink

Cons

While they've done a great job updating the product, however, I wish the pace of that was faster. For example, they introduced a new "Assessments" feature that was to eventually replace the "Test/Quiz" feature once it had all of the same options. While the question types in Assessments are nicer, it is two years later and it is still missing features of Test/Quiz including the ability to comment on individual student questions, auto-correction and rescoring if you made a mistake in setting up the correct answer in a question, and importantly, they still have not added a question test bank option for Assessments. Without the option to randomly pull questions from question banks I still use Test/Quiz for later end of unit assessments and semester exams.

Pros

Schoology is packed with features that let educators customize their courses and content to meet the specific learning needs of various populations of students. The user interface is fresh, simple, and easy to navigate. Many popular external applications are already integrated and available to use within the Schoology platform and sync effortlessly with the gradebook. For me personally, I really appreciate the way I can build customized, authentic, and engaging assessments from their wide assortment of question types. Schoology also has a badge rewards system where teachers can reward students for accomplishing certain tasks. Schoology simply is super customizable with a ton of features that other LMS don't offer.

Cons

As a user of many learning management systems over the past decade, there is no area where I feel Schoology is lacking in. It is the best for what it does.

Pros

There is an instant comfort to using Schoology for students and teachers. Most things are very easy to find and within a couple uses, teachers begin to develop confidence with the program. As a teacher, I was easily able to teach myself (with some online guidance) how to accomplish what I needed. The range of options available for free is outstanding and the paid version just adds the icing to the cake!

Cons

There are times where it seems like I have to click a lot of buttons to execute something. There are some quirks (as there are with many programs) that don't seem 100% logical to me. With that said, Schoology is always willing to listen, things may not be fixed immediately but it is nice to know they are aware.

Pros

What I like most about Schoology is the ability to integrate multiple external tools within a Schoology course--you can embed videos, apps, and other tools directly within Schoology, which allows students a single point of access for all of the learning tools they'll need for a given lesson. For example, you can easily embed a FlipGrid, Padlet, or EdPuzzle directly into Schoology--this has been a great benefit to teachers and students.

Cons

There are a few small issues that we have a Schoology users--the most notable is the inability to force-submit quizzes and tests on behalf of students who forget to submit their assessments. This makes it impossible for the teacher to grade a students work without having the student go in an press the submit button. Additionally, the inability of teachers to rotate pages in document submissions (i.e. the student uploads a document horizontally, but it needs to be read vertically) adds additional difficulties for teachers as they grade. Finally, the fact that when a student uploads multiple pages to an assignment, Schoology displays them in size order instead of in the order they are uploaded increases difficulty for teachers when it comes to grading because often an assignment is not in the correct order.

Pros

Having come from Google Classroom, Schoology is a more robust learning management system. Teachers can create assignments, discussions, assessments. There is more than just a stream of posts. Folders are necessary to organize content. There is a free version of it that still has decent features but the enterprise version has ALL the tools that you need to manage student learning, grades, feedback, and communication. The online grade-book has the ability to create assessments and rubrics and keep track of student performance. I love that students can use the app, in addition to the Chromebook.

Cons

The learning curve can be steep; the user interface can be overwhelming. I wish that I could link sections of courses so that the I didn't have to re-post the same items in another section. For example, I teach two 7th grade sections. I find myself manually copying and posting in each separately - this takes extra time. Right now this doesn't have grade-book integration for our district, they are working on it. Grade-book integration is truly a requirement. Students and parents also cite issues with things being reported as late/over due that actually are not. Parents may need a streamlined interface or some free training. In terms of communication, it would be helpful to see stats on the message (how many read out of how many).

Pros

Schoology is an easy to use LMS initially as a teacher and student. The best part is that there are so many added features and an amazing supportive community to help you customize and develop your courses even further. The customer service for Schoology is fantastic and the professional learning community in Schoology Educators is active and very helpful to anyone from a beginner to an advanced user. We did a side by side comparison between Schoology - Edmodo - Canvas and Google Classroom and our teachers and students completely supported our adoption of Schoology!

Cons

Some missing features include the ability to lock an entire folder and the ability to navigate quiz/tests more easily.

Pros

Schoology has played a critical role in helping teachers teach during our current pandemic situation. It is key that I can put curriculum online for students that are sick or in quarantine. It is also critical for when I have had to teach from home. It allows me to communicate with students regardless of the current conditions.

Cons

Figuring out the best way to assign things like google forms, and links to websites has been a little bit confusing because there is multiple ways to this. To find the most efficient way of using it has been a challenge.

Pros

As a vendor, Schoology is top notch. I feel like the crew there is an extension of my immediate work group. Everyone at Support, our Account Manager, and especially their PD team are friendly and professional. I follow many of them on Twitter and we share ideas and thoughts on the product. I'm thankful for their responsiveness and their authenticity about not being able to do everything at all times, but to hear all concerns and appropriately triage them for the product's future.

The product is very clean and straightforward. I am a system administrator for our institution, so I am always poking around in the nitty gritty. I may be the sole user at our institution that uses as many aspects of Schoology as I do. From course level settings, to groups, to system wide, I am all over the product and I heartily give my approval. I can navigate through the product with ease and can easily lead others in doing the same. I support our faculty and students on using the product, so it's great to know when I point them to a feature that it will always look and operate the same. I might say that is the BEST part of the product: the uniformity. We previously used Moodle, and our setup was not uniform. Thankfully, Schoology is.

Cons

The product is young and still catered towards the K12 environment. The language, the features, and the community of users are primarily K12. While that's not a big deal, it can often make community events or new features irrelevant to the higher ed environment.
The only other downside is that there are not many settings for students with special needs. It is often clunky to create workarounds to accommodate students who need more time in quizzes or struggle to access media content.

Pros

I love how easily Schoology is to manage, for students to use it, for me to be creative when working with it, for the programs embedded in and can be synchronized with it, and more. Schoology has extended my learning as a teacher and my students’ learning as well.

Cons

I wish that there was more language support other than Spanish for the site languages. Swahili and Arabic would be helpful to add since they are highly spoken in our district.

Pros

I like that we can set up folders and organize our course how we would like. I work with upper elementary so it worked fairly well, but definitely had a learning curve. Announcements were pretty easy to post. I also liked students messaging in schoology, they found this feature easy to use. I like that I also got an email when they messaged.

Cons

As a specialist teacher, it was confusing whether to work with the classroom teacher or have our own Schoology accounts. When giving feedback on assignments, students could never find it, they didn't get notifications. Students also struggled with how to turn in assignments and would do it differently. You could connect google docs and things, but was super confusing and students also didn't do this correctly. It also does not look modern, there are so many other platforms that look nicer and more kid-friendly. In addition, I like students to share photos and videos with one another and the social discussions/sharing piece was definitely lacking. we liked flipgrid but was not easily incorporated within schoology.

Pros

Schoology is a well designed program that is very similar to Google Classroom. In Schoology, it is easier to organize than google classroom within the certain classes. The teacher is able to create folders that include all the classwork for the students in color coordination. This is easier to view than google classroom, however it is more difficult to view the due dates.

Cons

The hardest part of the software to me is the attachment of files to the assignment. In google classroom, it is very easy to attach videos, files, links, and documents. There is a button that allows students to attach documents of their own, however most of the time in my experience it refuses to attach my document to the file. I have to end up copying and pasting my document into a new document. Also, if a student submits the assignment and then realizes he or she has made a mistake, sometimes there is no option to un-submit it. Also, it will sometimes submit multiple versions of the document as it is edited.

Pros

I love the easy look of it for the students to use and upload their assignments to.

Cons

I don't love how older curriculum is not stored for the students, but that may be something to do with the admin of the product and not the product itself.

Pros

Schoology is easy to use, provides an intuitive interface, and leverages the benefits of social media. As an Enterprise user, I have access to the full suite of analytics and universal settings, which are powerful. The mobile apps are feature-rich as well.

Cons

Schoology is not the ideal platform for higher education. The interface, while easy to navigate, is juvenile in its icons and profile images. And while it features a social media "wall" of recent activity across one's courses, the interface looks like an old Facebook. Also, Schoology's font, which cannot be altered, even by Enterprise users, is too small. This raises ADA compatibility concerns.

Pros

This platform has been a savior in the current remote learning context we are in with this extended closure due to COVID 19. They've adjusted their settings, provided support and are responsive to the customer needs.

Cons

I wish they would make blind scoring a reality in their platform for written work! This would allow us to eliminate one other platform and it seems like something that this LMS could manage.

Pros

Permits reconciliation with our school's report (grades are consequently imported to report cards for students and parents to see).Schoology has a straightforward and simple-to-utilize interface - it's easy to coordinate your study hall such that it checks out for the specific class you are instructing.

Cons

While composing remarks on task, the default is to NOT show the remarks to understudies - so that understudies might see, you should click a container prior to submitting and it is basically impossible to change that setting. Students can get carried away from the main educational focus and get distracted.You may not have more than one student account.

Pros

This software was given to us a few days prior to school but we were told it was what we were using for virtual teaching. Therefore a rough start but not Schoology's fault. The software was taught to us in a quick fashion but was easy to use once I got the hang of it. I am learning more as time goes by and am pleased with how easily students and an older teacher such as myself can learn. The integration of materials is easy and allows for individualized learning and assessment for our diverse student body.

Cons

I do not like the setup for assessment being in a different place than the due dates. I wish it was all in one easy place such as when setting up the assessment. I also wish the bulk edit button had a link to alter questions if a mistake was found so I do not have to go looking for the assessment.