Blackbaud Tuition Management vs. Schoolmint Hero

Smart Tuition is a good platform for schools that want to incorporate the financial aid application process and billing together. Parent use is easy to navigate, and it reduces the time spent by school staff to manage accounts. In a school where the financial aid application process is not done by a third party, Smart Tuition may not be the option they are looking to implement.

Incentivized

Hero is a great time saver for any busy school administrator. Students are able to use technology to earn positive points and also track and manage their own discipline. It is user-friendly and adaptable to the specific needs of the school. I love writing my own tracking codes and setting the action thresholds.

Incentivized

• Website is easy to navigate
• Customer service is very professional and helpful
• Multiple options for making payments and setting up accounts

Incentivized

• Allows ALL students to earn points at the push of a button.
• Connects with infinite Campus so student schedules and info are always accurate on the Hero site.
• Allows teachers to create their own groups for after school programs or even small groups in their classrooms.

• I have been happy with Smart Tuition and have not had any issues.

Incentivized

• Hero had the Hero Homeroom where teachers could collaborate and receive rewards but that was discontinued. I think that a similar reward system for those who are supposed to be inputting information would be helpful, where consistency for the required input is rewarded. For example: teachers were to be recording points for all their students every period every day - if they received points for completing their input & could then choose to spend those points on rewards that would help encourage participation to make it more successful overall.
• Too hands-off in making sure that implementation is as successful as possible.
• Too techie for non-tech savvy people.

Incentivized

It is a great product

again. for the day to day usage, adding points is a bit of a chore but I keep doing it because the students respond

Incentivized

Someone is always available. I like being able to call, chat, or email as needed. There are also a lot of tutorials and webinars provided. Hero does a good job of providing tools for onboarding new users and customers as well. It is easy to find whatever information you are looking for.

Incentivized

I use FACTS in my role at work, and my children's school uses Smart Tuition. I am more familiar with Smart Tuition as a parent, but it seems to be a good solution for the high school. Since we do the financial aid in-house at my school of employment, FACTS works better for us.

Incentivized

We used a tardy tracking system a couple years ago but it wasn't as efficient as Hero. It did not keep track of any positive behaviors. I don't remember the name of the system but I know it only focused on the negative behaviors and giving out consequences for those negative behaviors.

Incentivized

• Excellent tracking of accounts for the school
• Customer service interacts with the parents' questions
• One system for the school staff to manage

Incentivized

• Definitely worth the money. The kids are happy, they're using the program as often as they can, and they appreciate the opportunity to be rewarded for their good behavior.
• We've been able to sustain a store, and that's super awesome. I know we wouldn't be able to without the help of Hero and the ways in which we keep the hype.
• I think I need more help with teacher adoption. We have a lot of initiatives at our school, so we're trying to take on a little more than we can chew at this point. We're getting there though!