Likelihood to Recommend This software is perfect for any company that has document/pdf-based training files that they want to convert into actual training modules for new employees. It is easy for new employees to use and navigate, and the quizzes that can be added at the end of each section/module are great for ensuring new employees' understanding of your content. It probably wouldn't be best suited if you need more interaction during your training process - but for those that just need employees to view and read text/images/videos and to be quizzed after, it is great.
Read full review I've used Sakai to supplement my Public Speaking class. Public Speaking is very much a F2F type course, so I didn't use Sakai much for course content delivery. However, I did use it to post my syllabus, post my lecture slides, communicate any class announcements, and to conduct a final exam for the class. Building the final exam was very simple and I was easily able to swap out questions to vary it from term to term. Before I was a staff member and lecturer, I used Sakai as a student. My instructor used Sakai to varying degrees. I really appreciated it being the one-stop-receptacle for all-things class related. If I somehow lost an assignment instruction sheet, I could rely on it being posted there. For multimedia work it was lacking, at that time, but I know Sakai has been updated over time and I hope that part of it has improved. If I was ever frustrated by Sakai, it was because faculty used it in a piecemeal way. It's fine not to want to use the gradebook, but don't enter some grades and not others. It's wonderful to upload class documents to it; but don't do some and not others. Whatever way you're going to use Sakai, commit to it and use it well. Your students will thank you.
Read full review Pros Assign a predefined route to a certain place User interface is very good and clean Very effective user experience Issues or problems are handled rapidly by their customer support team Read full review Sakai is flexible, providing a way for our customers (instructors) to customize their courses while staying in line with consistency and continuity of course design. This has allowed our courses to be far less cookie-cutter and stale. This is mostly accomplished through Sakai's LTI functionality and it's Lessons tool. This is particularly notable because not every course is the same, nor should it be. Our faculty and course developers can draw from OER resources, course text publisher assessment quiz banks and pull in content from sources from our library databases and services like YouTube. Sakai is customizable, allowing us to pair it with our student information system to automatically create and track with student registration data - including adding new students and removing students who have elected to drop a course. The customization features also include being able to create course templates for individual schools or courses using specific tools or sequences of tools as well as a way to personalize content for students when they engage with each lesson. Sakai is stable in the market. We have been using Sakai for almost 10 years and continue to see it improve; responding to changing trends in browser technologies, mobile platforms and accessibility requirements. Multiple programs offered over the years have been recognized by outside organizations like BestColleges.com for our programs and given high marks by students taking the courses offered in Sakai. Sakai allows our faculty to inform it's continued evolution. We work closely with the developers, having a front seat to how things can work and function for our faculty. There have been multiple occasions where faculty ask, "Can Sakai do this?" and the answer is never "No." Read full review Cons We have courses that are required for each employee based on their job title, and then, many courses we consider to be elective for that job title. We have not found a method to distinguish between those in order to view an employee's performance on required courses only. Reports are only available by user ID or user name. We have some facilities or managers who need the user ID (based on payroll entry) and some that need names (employees they interact with each day). Read full review The coming upgrade will address many issues, the visual presentation of sites and courses The Forums (discussion) tool is not natively integrated into the Gradebook, but needs another step to connect the two. The Wiki tool is awkward and not WYSIWYG. But I understand that is common with wikis in most platforms The Help documentation could use some focus on student needs rather that course developer needs Read full review Likelihood to Renew We have not had any problems with TalentLMS. It has worked well for all of our employees.
Read full review Sakai is a good general learning management system - it is not leading edge but rather a stable system with standard learning management system features. It can be fairly easily customized and is fairly easy to learn from both student learning and faculty administrative vantage points. New paradigms for online learning though are emergent so the current field should also be investigated with competitors.
Read full review Usability When faculty are preparing courses from term to term, a portion of the content is static within a specific discipline. The time it takes to import past lessons into new versions of Sakai can be an inefficient use of my time. When I want to add new content and edit from the old content, it's reliant upon me to cut and paste the content from term to term rather than simply import and edit from a backup.
Read full review Support Rating The support is great, you can either go online and get the training you need or you can work with talent directly to get the support you need, they are readily and easily available and are very friendly, the support structure that they have is great. The other thing is that from a bug's perspective Talent has never had any issue so I really haven't had to use the support outside of trying to figure out how to do certain things.
Read full review Since Sakai is open-source their documentation is often lacking and support is absolutely needed onsite. Internal documentation is more important with Sakai than other services. The Sakai community is fun, passionate, engaged, and absolutely doing their best, but it's an uphill battle against the current market and trends.
Read full review Implementation Rating No, I don't
Read full review Alternatives Considered TalentLMS is more all-inclusive with a lot of great options and the ability to upload PowerPoint presentations. Some of the other LMS companies required other software ad-ons, oftentimes with a cost, to meet functionality. Some other companies use a different format for training reports. Unlike TalentLMS, in which Excel-based reports are very easily generated.
Read full review As an adjunct professor, I didn't pick Sakai for the university. I have experience with
Moodle ,
Blackboard , eCollege, iBoard and now Sakai. I would have to say that Sakai is one of my all time favorite LMSs to use as it is very easy to navigate.
Read full review Return on Investment Dramatically more cost-effective than alternatives, with greater feature sets. Made our eCommerce training deployment a breeze. Hard to attribute an ROI to just the LMS specifically but it would be a high multiple in a period of just a few months. Read full review Sakai makes it easy for students to monitor grades which puts their minds at ease. Sakai makes it easy for teachers to assign and receive assignments from students. Communication is one of the most important and one of the most taxing parts of an educational system. Sakai makes this process just a little bit easier. Read full review ScreenShots