DigitalChalk, by Sciolytix vs. NovoEd

Digital Chalk is perfect for organizations who are looking for an easy to use Learning Management System and don't need all the bells, whistles, and bulk of the LMS giants, like Cornerstone or SuccessFactors. Digital Chalk doesn't require an administrative specialist to learn a whole new language and environment with endless options and settings. It's very easy to use for both learners and administrators, and yet at the same time provides the exact functions you need.

Incentivized

NovoEd is well suited for synchronous and asynchronous training. Best suited if you want to leverage social components, discussions, assignments and peer-to-peer learning. We run global cohorts to take advantage of the diversity and create community. That works great. I think that when you need to leverage other design options, in an example, add features to display content in other ways, other types of design even in page layout, then you have limited options (but I haven't found any other better than Novoed in this space). Reports are useful, but more options would be appreciated

Incentivized

• While I used the platform, it improved its integrations with PowerPoint, making it easy to convert slides to the DigitalChalk format.
• The editing layers for audio underneath the slides is very user-friendly and easy to use.
• While we didn't use the quiz randomization, I liked how there was a structure built to it so that those who had more robust usage situations than ours would be able to improve engagement and assess learning at a higher level.

Incentivized

• Easy to upload content and videos and easy to edit and modify. Allows to program when a module or section can be launched and to schedule specific communication messages to audience. Assignments can be approved to review the quality of deliverables.
• The peer-to-peer learning features in NovoEd are great. Discussions allow to connect with the author of the discussion and also with peers. Peers can see other peer’s comments and submissions and comment and learn from those.
• User friendly, easy to navigate and structure easy to understand
• Leaderboard so participants can see how they are doing compared to others

Incentivized

• The administration of Digital Chalk is very easy. The function I think may be missing is an easy way to add revisions and assign them to the students who need them. For example, when you update a piece of a course it would have an indication that it is version xxx and would ask who would like to assign it to - everyone who has taken it before or just new students.
• It would nice to have the system recognize when a student has already completed an element of a course that may be used in another course. For example, if video A is part of courses 1 and 2, and the student already watched it in course 1, it would ask the administrator if they should get automated credit for it in course 2, as well.

Incentivized

• The options to design a page are limited: page width, navigation, margins, headers, etc. Design feels limited
• Does not allow for a lot of customization. All pages flow in the same way so after a few courses, feels repetitive
• I am not a technical expert, so I do not know how to embed html content to create other options to display content, in an example: sections that open when you click, etc.
• To have different languages, you have to clone the course and translate and create a separate course.

Incentivized

As I mentioned previously, Digital Chalk's customer support is excellent. I also got a reply back within an hour, and it was usually the same person. So, they were familiar with our needs and how we were using the system. Honestly, most of the time we had to contact their support, it was an issue on the user's side, not in the software. Yet, they still helped identify the issue and consulted on how to fix it.

Incentivized

DigitalChalk gave the organization the hands-on ownership of content creation and delivery while meeting our usage case of hands-off course management on a daily basis and extending the reach of the course content and certificate to as many people as possible. It's easy to use, very cost-effective to implement, and the overall experience means that the course participants get what they need out of the course without a lot of effort on their part.

Incentivized

Much more user-friendly, easy to use. The LMS (Saba and cornerstone) are not user-friendly, tons of more clicks are needed to arrive at a course. We decided on Novoed because of the user experience for end users. LMS very focused on compliance and tracking and not in user experience. Fuse was much more social than our strategy, there every user can upload content. We wanted still to have the discipline of having instructional design, goals, etc, so Fuse was not an option.

Incentivized

• DigtialChalk's ROI is positive - the cost model of low up-front costs to get started, then paying a small amount per course participant means that organizations implementing DigitalChalk as their platform get more than their money's worth from it. It returns profit quickly and on a consistent basis.
• The asynchronous nature of the platform, combined with the targeted usage situation of hands-off course delivery and management, means that resources to create, deliver, and maintain courses can be held with either one person (like an instructional designer) or even an outside contractor. This means that there's little impact to the fixed operating costs involved with hiring someone else to manage it.

Incentivized

• Very high participants engagement & participation (completion)
• Social components allows to avoid an isolated experience

Incentivized