Likelihood to Recommend Colleague Student is a great solution for smaller schools. I'm not sure it would work well at a large university (10,000 plus students) -- I'm not sure it has capacity to handle that. It is also well suited for universities where departments communicate well with each other. There is so much cross functionality, that if departments don't communicate well, issues could arise if one department makes changes without notifying or talking with other departments about the change
Becky Lambert Dean of Academic Services and Assistant Professor of Higher Education
Read full review There is nothing specific that I would say sets it apart from any other LMS, but once you are used to the user interface and various features, it does everything that is needed and integrates well enough with other software to function. Probably isn't necessary in a smaller setting, but for multiple building districts, it is certainly robust enough to handle data collection and storage.
Read full review Pros Colleague offers a single reference point for all student data, which creates consistency and unity across campus and ensures students hear the same information from every source. Colleague recently updated its interface to be more accessible to all people. Previously, it was not accessible through any browser aside from Internet Explorer. Colleague provide helpful user restrictions that prevent departments from altering or erasing data they do not typically use. For example, I cannot change student billing and accidentally wreak havoc for the cashier's office. Read full review Flexibility. This multitude of fields available makes it easy to capture data the way we want or need to. Quick response to trouble tickets. The company strives to reach out to the customer within an hour and start the process of resolution. User focused. Improvements to the system always look at how the end user experience can be enhanced. Read full review Cons Develop API's that are vendor agnostic rather than selecting specific vendors (Clearinghouse, ImageNow). Colleague tends to be to reactionary to the changing needs in higher education rather than developing the future. Hound clients to pay extra for consulting (consultants are usually bad), rather than helping institutions to use the product. Seems to be the first thing help line personnel jump to rather than working with clients to figure out creative solutions. Rodney Parks University Registrar and Special Assistant to the Provost
Read full review Confusion when it comes to student grades- sometimes there are two different letter grades for a student for what is posted as "TR1" and "PR1." How does a teacher know which of these grades will be posted to a student's report card? How does a teacher know what the student's actual grade is for a particular course? Switching between the Educator Access Plus and Student Management tabs can be complicated, especially for those new to the system. Why can't everything be in one place? I recognize that Skyward logs out after a certain period of inactivity to preserve privacy of users, but is there a way to change those settings so that Skyward does not log out as frequently? It is difficult to keep having to log back in completely again. Read full review Likelihood to Renew It is the system I am most comfortable with, so having to learn a new system outweighs any problems I have with Skyward.
Read full review Usability It takes some time to get used to navigating the features and layers, but once you know your way around it, it's pretty good.
Read full review Support Rating Overall great job, issues were taken care of. People in support do care.
Read full review Implementation Rating Yes, I was part of the implementation team.
Read full review Alternatives Considered Ellucian Colleague remains the most cost competitive solution for our organization. Alternative solutions, have had ridiculously high migration costs and ongoing maintenance fees which have not been friendly toward a migration of our existing data. Some the features of the other solutions are very nice to "haves" but the reward has to out-weigh the cost of adoption.
Read full review I, personally, have not used other Student Management Systems, but having used Skyward, I do not necessarily feel any overwhelming desire to seek out the competitive software programs. Skyward does what it says it will and provides my school district with an easy and organized way to share and access all of the relevant student and family information we need. It serves it's purpose well and meets our needs.
Read full review Return on Investment By keeping student's academic work, financial aid, and accounts receivable information in one location we are able to report without the need for data aggregation. Colleague's web applications allow the students themselves to perform tasks such as enrollment without assistance from staff members. Using customized rules that we can set up in Colleague we can trigger events to happen as data is entered. This eliminates the need not only for someone to remember to perform an additional task, but it also saves the time of performing the actual task. Read full review Overall, Skyward has had a positive impact. One way is the student information that is shared and available to see. If I need to know something about a student’s academic history, Skyward has it. Another way it has impacted our district is the way it has streamlined all of our payroll information. I can see check histories, different parts of my salary, and the year-end totals all in one place. Skyward has also made a big impact on our district by making it easier to communicate with parents. All the parents’ contact information is available and email is even included in the program. Read full review ScreenShots