Instructure is an educational software company based in Sandy, Utah. It is the developer of the Canvas learning management system, which is a comprehensive software package that competes with such systems as Blackboard Learning System, SumTotal and Saba.
N/A
Slack
Score 9.0 out of 10
N/A
Slack is a group messaging or team collaboration app that aims to simplify communication for businesses. Features include open discussions, private groups, and direct messaging, as well as deep contextual search and message archiving, and file sharing. Slack integrates with a number of other tools, such as MailChimp, Dropbox, and Google Drive. Slack was acquired by Salesforce in December 2020.
The product is free to use, and also has paid plans with more features and greater controls.
The…
$8.75
per month per user
Pricing
Canvas
Slack
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Free
$0
Pro
$7.25*
per month per user
Business+
$12.50*
per month per user
Enterprise
Contact Sales
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Canvas
Slack
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
Yes
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
Must contact vendor for pricing information.
*Per active user, per month, when paying once a year.
Pro is $8.75 USD per active user when paying month to month. Business+ is $15.00 USD per active user when paying month to month.
Assistant Director of Housing and Residence Life for Marketing and Communications and Technology
Chose Canvas
I have used Blackboard for years and Canvas blows it out of the water. I always felt like Blackboard was outdated and using Canvas has really sped up my teaching and course creation. What used to take me days, now just takes a few hours. There was a slight learning curve, but I …
Canvas's ease of use and ease of administration were huge deciding factors in the decision to use Canvas as our preferred LMS. We found that on average Canvas took 1/3 the clicks to accomplish the same tasks as Blackboard, and the structure of data in Canvas is far superior to …
Canvas provides a nice blend of intuitive, simple interfaces with strong functionality. Other products will often try to do too much and become bloated (e.g., BB) or are not mature enough to provide reliable functionality in key areas without extensive support (e.g., Moodle). …
It is really well suited for school situations like knowing what [assignments] need to be done when, getting feedback, getting points, finding the slides that the teacher used for explaining an [assignment] or theory. I think It would be less suited in business situations because it's [primarily] made to be a [one-way] communication tool for schools. Businesses need more control on individual levels I think[.]
Slack is great for tracking commits to new coding projects. You can take parts of code that still need to be implemented later and easily search through the history of comments if there is something that goes wrong with a code commitment. It can be difficult for people that only like Teams to adjust to a new platform if you are using both to communicate.
Creativity options for teachers to create a virtual space that still has fun graphics and accessibility options.
Canvas has versatility in viewing options for assignment due dates such as the calendar built in feature as well as the dashboard options to display upcoming and due assignments.
Allowing teachers to create community with each other and collaborate in each-other's space.
Discussion platforms within classrooms for students to communicate with each-other and with their teachers.
Easy messaging portal within each virtual classroom.
Would love a better integration with GitHub. For example, notifications when your PR is updated, when review is requested, @-mention in comments, etc.
Improved "Later" tab, for example the ability to create to-do lists or making the "Later" tab into a more powerful to-do list (annotate items with notes)
More powerful integrations, e.g. Google Calendar could render a calendar view within Slack, rather than sending the daily schedule
The other LMS tools have fallen behind. One reason is they are not able to update their systems, features, toolsets in a timely manner. While other LMS providers release bug fixes and new features several times a year, schools struggle to install and implement them in a timely manner. It is not uncommon for a school to take 6 months to a year to fully install and implement new releases on other LMS platforms. With Canvas, those features are released every 3 weeks, and there is nothing for a school to do other than choose to turn them on once released. This has allowed Instructure to innovate faster, and get new features and tools to customers quicker. Other factors include great pricing, customer support, and the innovative way in which LTI is implemented in the tool.
To be more transparent, I give 10 because Slack serves our collaboration needs. It provide us a good platform for team communication relaying important update within the company, it has even mobile app where you can install in your phone to monitor any updates within that team that needs your immediate attention and intervention.
The functions in Canvas are well integrated and consistent across the application, and mostly intuitive. Overall navigation and setup is streamlined through integrated features and navigation. The feedback we've gotten from our program participants is that it is easy to learn to use. It also integrates well with third party software like Google Docs and Blackboard Collaborate web conferencing software
My rating was 7. Its intuitive interface and user-friendly features like channels, threads, and integrations make it excellent for team communication and onboarding. However, its usability is held back by the resource-intensive desktop app and cluttered feeling in large workspaces. The mobile app's performance and unreliable notifications have also been noted as weaknesses.
Yes, the app works 24/7. I don't even recall having any period that we could not use since the implementation. Even the maintenance periods are barely noticeable and our work is not impacted by it when it happens.
Slack is a soft app, we don't have many issues with it. I recall one or two people complaining about something during our usage period, but I didn't have a bad experience. When the app is slow, usually the problem is with my computer or my internet. The app works just fine.
I do not personally use Canvas support since we have a central office that helps us. However, our central office always has the answers we need and are always able to solve our issues - so I would assume that get great support from the Canvas team on their end. They also offer great training, which uses materials directly from Canvas
Whenever I've had to troubleshoot an issue with Slack (which, to be honest, has not happened very often), their online documentation has been easy to locate, easy to understand, and effective in resolving my issue. Slack's ever-growing popularity also means that there's a large community of practice out there that can be depended upon.
Once you purchase and sign the contract there is nothing to install or hardware to buy. You can almost immediately start using it and have courses up and going within weeks. We signed in December and had pilot courses online ready to go for the start of school in January
Canvas is more secure, has a cleaner design, and has more features. For the features, they have in common canvas still stacks up against [Smart school] by going for the extra mile. Besidfor e that, [the] canvas looks a lot more [professional] than [Smart school]. I didn't make the decision myself to get canvas instead of [Smart school] but I'm happy they did.
I like Slack better than ClickUp, because I would spend 30-60 minutes a day updating my ClickUp tasks. The way ClickUp was used was very micromanaging. I billed by the hour, so I was willing to put in the time to alert the boss what tasks I was working on.
One of my jobs used Hive - I mostly just ran it in the background in case anyone messaged me. I did not use it often.
Slack has been incredibly helpful in connecting various tech apps and ecosystems, creating a more streamlined and responsive process.
Slack has made it significantly easier to communicate with our team members across multiple time zones, creating a more engaging environment for our all-remote team.