Blackboard Learn by Anthology vs. Jenzabar ONE vs. Slate.org

A school with a well-established technology imprint with their students (for example, ours is a BYOB school where every student has their own laptop and must bring it to school every day and where over 99% of our families have reliable broadband at home) is a reasonable scenario for using The arrogance and intransigence of the sales force is quite disconcerting… They are no longer the only game in town and don't yet realize it. Less well-off schools/families may find it a challenge if students must be on campus or at a public library in order to use the technology. Obviously, during the pandemic, this became problematic for some districts.

Incentivized

Jenzabar ONE is strongly suited for an all-in one solution for higher ed. The modern web-based platform make it efficient for end users. An institution that wants a full communication platform to connect with students, Jenzabar is the right product for your school. As with any product, development with Jenzabar One continues which is a good thing but also may cause some schools to want more features more quickly.

Incentivized

Slate.org is a great tool for reassuring students that documents have been transmitted successfully. The uncertainty in the college process means that students and parents tend to worry about what cannot be seen. Slate.org helps me reassure my students and families that documents have been received.

• Blackboard Learn makes submitting assignments electronically simple and provides a variety of built-in Web-based tools like e-portfolios, wikis, and blogs that our students use to create their own content.
• Blackboard Learn is intuitive and easy to navigate from a students perspective
• Blackboard Learn has many integrations available for connecting this LMS to other tools we use at our institution.

Incentivized

• Jenzabar ONE makes working within the system possible and secure using remote and WFH options.
• Jenzabar ONE is adept at managing the central functions of the Registrar's Office.
• Jenzabar ONE is capable and adequate for student accounts and billing.

Incentivized

• Slate.org is constantly looking to expand the schools that participate, building a larger network.
• Slate.org is committed to equity among secondary school partners
• Slate.org regularly seeks feedback to enhance its products

• Blackboard Learn has some limitations when it comes to submissions
• It is not that user friendly, I had to spend some time to get a hang of it in the beginning
• I have been struggling a bit with deletion of manually added courses

Incentivized

• the Help system does not always correlate to the current version, so updating that with each update would be very helpful
• a method to test users' permission would be very helpful
• it is sometimes tricky trying to figure out which functions to assign to users, so making that process more clear would be great

• I'm hopeful to see more development of ease of navigation within the ux
• I'd like to see a larger number of participating universities

There are several aspects of Desire2Learn that outweigh the benefits of using Blackboard. I find that the Desire2Learn system is a bit more user friendly and looks more up-to-date. However, the decision to renew systems is not up to me because the entire University uses the same system. Regardless, I think I would choose Desire2Learn over Blackboard because of its improved user interface.

It is very usable for both faculty and students. The interface is pretty intuitive and most students can use it without a lot of additional training. Faculty do need some training to effectively use the interface, but they usually get it pretty quickly. We have had to create some additional programming to give faculty a way to delve deeper into the content.

My overall experience using Jenzabar One for student housing has been very productive. The system provides a centralized platform where I can manage room assignments, monitor occupancy, and access important student information quickly. Its integration with other campus modules makes it easy to verify enrollment, confirm eligibility, and coordinate with departments such as Admissions, Financial Aid, and the Registrar. Having all of this information in one place streamlines daily housing operations and supports efficient decision-making. Overall, Jenzabar One has been a reliable tool that helps me stay organized and effectively manage the student housing process.

My Blackboard support comes from the university I work with. They are responsive--eventually... but it takes them sometimes a week to respond to a reported issue. For example, I reported 2 issues last week and one was resolved and I was contacted about one still open option today. That is too long for a tech issue. I have not contacted any support offered directly by Blackboard, which may be a completely different experience altogether.

Incentivized

Never contacted support before.

Blackboard's Managed Hosting was top-notch in getting us up and running quickly.

Incentivized

Coursera offers a variety of modules in which a team is able to work on then, but [Blackboard Learn] offers more options to understand how are the team members developing and which tasks have offered a harder challenger for them. [Blackboard Learn] also offers a variety of reports that can be generate by a team lead.

Incentivized

Jenzabar ONE has 90% of the capabilities of of its competitors, and a price point significantly below those products. Both Banner and PeopleSoft provide capabilities that exceed what we need. Paying for those additional features is not cost effective. In short, Jenzabar ONE does nearly everything we need, and both Banner and PeopleSoft only offer extra capabilities we will not use.

Incentivized

• At one of the institutions that I worked for, the ROI was excellent for the number of users we were serving; however, I could not speak to other instances as I was not aware of the overall cost of the contract.

Incentivized

• Implementing the new admissions portal has led to a 12% increase in enrollment as we were able to spend time directly working with students with how it automated previously manual tasks.
• The ACH and credit card payment portal with self-selection of student payment plans has allowed the business office to collect 70% of what we used to send to collections.

• Slate.org has given us one more tool in a varied landscape of data submission and tracking