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Cengage MindTap Reviews and Ratings

Rating: 9 out of 10
Score
9 out of 10

Community insights

TrustRadius Insights for Cengage MindTap are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.

Pros

User-Friendly Platform: Many users have found Cengage MindTap to be a user-friendly platform, allowing both students and faculty to navigate and utilize it with ease. The intuitive design and organized presentation of content enhance the overall learning experience.

Outstanding Customer Support: MindTap's customer support has received high praise from multiple reviewers. Users have expressed their satisfaction with the dedicated representatives who are responsive, proactive, and regularly reach out to assist those in need. This level of support has greatly contributed to a positive user experience.

Seamless Integration with Learning Management Systems: Reviewers have highlighted the seamless integration of MindTap with popular learning management systems like Blackboard. Importing content into an LMS is easily done, and the software's customization options and integration with course Grade Center are highly appreciated. This streamlined process saves time for instructors when setting up courses each semester.

Reviews

8 Reviews

MindTap automates and facilitates learning and administrative management in any educational center

Rating: 9 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

The MindTap application is a very useful tool for those who want to teach a distance learning course, it is one of the best editing integrators you can get. Among its many functions we can add textbook plug-ins to speed up learning. The technical support provided by MindTap has been one of the best integrations that this tool has, in case you have a question or problem with the application, the support staff is very friendly and 100% of the problems are solved in record time. MindTap is an application that has been perfectly easy to adapt to the students and older teachers we have. At times it can be tedious with its endless pop-up windows, but overall, we have had an excellent time using it.

Pros

  • The main advantage of MindTap application is that you can add digital textbooks as a support complement, apart from that they have accessibility tools that integrate between reading voice in high volume and a tool to take notes quickly in case of making a note.
  • MindTap allows us to synchronize with applications such as Blackboard to import content into an LMS. We can import and export from grades or preset activities for students. It also has the option to copy and paste content from one semester to another.
  • The application has an extension for cell phones, students can access any material such as flash cards wherever they are. It has been completely useful as it shows grades digitally while other institutions only use printed books.
  • The application integrates an LTI section where all the information and planning of activities, exams and grades can be imported into the same learning system, unifying the entire course in a single window per course.
  • As for the exams and evaluations given to our students, the application also allows us to create self-evaluation questionnaires to determine how effective your instructors are, and they can also create customizable exams for each student.
  • The application has a section where we can assign an internal technical support staff so that both teachers and students can contact each other to solve any problems that may arise.

Cons

  • For those who are just using the app, it can be frustrating with ad blockers. Because MindTap has so many pop-ups, the blockers sometimes don't even let it open the platform properly and tends to generate a lot of frustration with students.
  • The application sets statuses to differentiate who is an instructor and who is a student, however, the application lacks a robust set of roles to set or change those statuses. It is very complicated, for example, to upgrade a regular student to an assistant worker when they are in the internship stage.
  • The application is totally different between students and instructors; for the former the usability can be very comfortable, but for teachers it can be frustrating because of its lack of robustness to implement functions that we consider basic.

Likelihood to Recommend

We started using the application optimally at the beginning as a digital learning and consultation platform. In it we imported all kinds of bibliographic material so that students could access them with the ease of a tap. The application is perfect for those instructors who are not beginners in HTML. In that case, the application very practically allows them to create a complete course in the shortest possible time because it has a state-of-the-art instructional design. It was excellent for unifying all the basic course plans between teachers teaching the same subject, giving the advantage that all courses at the same level would have exactly the same information and nothing would be overlooked

VU
Verified User
Supervisor in Marketing (201-500 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
1 year of experience

MindTap in my Business Statistics class

Rating: 10 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I am using MindTap in my Business Statistics classes at the School of Business, College of Charleston. I believe other professors in other courses are also using MindTap to help students' learning. I use MindTap because it has useful features that help students engage, visualize, and understand statistics better. It has applets, videos, and applied exercises that complement my classes. Also, it has assignments where students can apply the concepts and learn by doing. After three years of using it in my classes, I believe it helps provide a structure for the class and guide students in learning business statistics.

Pros

  • MindTap has applets that help me show students abstract concepts of statistics. Ba accessing and dragging the pointer over a distribution, I can show students how probabilities change as a results of changes in the area under the chart.
  • It has interesting videos showing applications of statistics by companies.
  • MindTap has assignments and additional tool students can use to learn-by-doing, getting feedback immediately.

Cons

  • I'd like to change some questions, eliminating parts of questions that I don't cover in a specific class.
  • I'd like to have random words replacing words in problems' statement to prevent students from looking for answer over the internet.

Likelihood to Recommend

MindTap seems a good fit for math and statistic based classes where students need additional tools to understand concepts and must practice exercises to get the dynamics of how to apply math and statistics tools to solve real problems. I never used MindTap for a conceptual-based class, so I don't know how it can add for a class that does not have math and statistics.

RT
Rafael Teixeira
Assistant Professor at College of Charleston (1001-5000 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
3 years of experience

MindTap gets students thinking

Rating: 10 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Several of our faculty in the Human Services discipline use Cengage. I have used MindTap for several years, and recently began using the Inclusive Access so my students have access to all of the resources from day one of the semester.

Pros

  • Great resources
  • Value for money
  • Awesome customer service

Cons

  • Need to have dates in MindTap sync with LMS D2L

Likelihood to Recommend

MindTap is excellent for use in the Human Services discipline. The videos, case scenarios. and quizzes are very good. The e-text has great features, such as the ability to highlight and annotate. Also, the reflection activities are wonderful.

VU
Verified User
Professional (1001-5000 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
3 years of experience

MindTap saves students thousand of dollars!

Rating: 10 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use MindTap for 80% of our online business courses using Blackboard LMS. We plan to use MindTap for 100% of our online business courses within the next year.

Pros

  • User friendly
  • Platform neutral
  • Interactive
  • Adaptive

Cons

  • Include simulation-type projects to decrease online cheating
  • Make assignments more "game-like"
  • More multimedia, color, graphics, ect

Likelihood to Recommend

MindTap is incredibly easy to use and versatile. Ideally suited for online students; both traditional and non-traditional. Mindtap might not be suitable for some high-level disciplines as it currently exists. For example, chemistry and some biology courses may not be suited for MindTap as it currently exists. However, if it were revised to include more simulation activities, adaptive learning, and high-level interaction, it could certainly be appropriate.

LM
Lois McWhorter
Chair at University of the Cumberlands (501-1000 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
20 years of experience

MindTap has quality content

Rating: 9 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

The arts department uses MindTap to teach art history to college students. The college teaches multiple courses using MindTap educational materials. The benefit of all faculty in the department teaching with MindTap, is that it unified the core curriculum being taught between course sections. It has also been helpful to assist adjunct staff in preparation for teaching this course, since the college can give them a base template of information to build out the course.

Pros

  • Organized clear presentation.
  • Accessibility issues are well considered.
  • Offers multiple activities to reinforce the learning.
  • Syncs with Blackboard gradebook.

Cons

  • They took away some of the variety of assignments and I wish they would add them back.
  • Course settings could be more streamlined. Sometimes it’s tedious to make simple changes to the course.
  • MindTap will not work unless students turn off pop up blockers, and this is a challenge that blocks an easy start with the software. If this could be worked out, it would give students a better experience at setup.

Likelihood to Recommend

MindTap is great to unify curriculum among multiple faculty. It makes the development and set up of the course easier. The overall organization of learning content is easy for students to comprehend and follow throughout the semester. Students like the learning reinforcement tools, audio reader, added videos, glossary of terms, Google Earth links etc.

VU
Verified User
Professional (501-1000 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
5 years of experience

Supporting Student Learning Outcomes with MindTap's Flexible Digital Textbook Platform

Rating: 9 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

MindTap is a third-party publisher integration used by many faculty to support teaching and learning in their courses. It is bundled with textbooks and added as a "plugin" to our learning management system (Blackboard) for easier sign-in and course content integration. MindTap provides digital textbooks, interactive exercises, videos, practice quizzes, exams, flash cards, and other learning assets to support student learning outcomes.

Pros

  • digital textbook platform with accessibility tools (read-aloud, note taking)
  • interactive exercises and practice tools
  • assessments including self-check quizzes and customizable exams
  • LTI integration to pass grade information to learning management system
  • excellent support for faculty

Cons

  • lots of clicking required to navigate through content or set-up
  • inconsistent student experiences for Original vs. Ultra courses in Blackboard
  • challenging to remove excessive/duplicate gradebook columns when cloning/recycling a course

Likelihood to Recommend

MindTap is one of the best publisher integrations. The textbook platform is thoughtfully designed to support a variety of learning preferences including reading and listening. Note taking tools, flash cards, and self-check quizzing along with videos and supplemental exercises (depending on course content) help students practice what they are learning. However, MindTap can suffer from content bloat. It's easier to embed content in one's LMS course to the point where there are too many links to make the course or its gradebook functional. Faculty want a seamless content experience, and MindTap delivers, but it's often at the expense of the student who has to navigate through dozens of links to keep up with course content.

MH
Mariann Hawken
e-Learning Coordinator in Information Technology at University of Maryland Baltimore County (1001-5000 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
7 years of experience
View profile

MindTap Review

Rating: 1 out of 10

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I’m using it for learning courses for school and it has been really awful and stressful to use.

Pros

  • It’s slow.
  • Freezes up.
  • No help for support.

Cons

  • Needs better support.
  • Easier assignments.
  • Less assignments.

Likelihood to Recommend

This system has made it very difficult to do my work. It gave way too many assignments in a short time. No one could help when the system wasn’t working right. It freezes and some assignments wouldn’t open!

AT
Ashley Tharp
at Ivy tech (1-10 employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
1 year of experience

Building Engaging Course Content Rapidly with Cengage MindTap

Rating: 8 out of 10
Incentivized

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

MindTap has been essential in helping up building out course content for various online courses in our MBA program including Corporate Finance, various law courses, Accounting, and Financial Reporting. The LMS integration and test banks allow us to maintain fresh assessment each semester and the eBook saves our students a lot of time and trouble in hunting down a hard copy version of the text book.

Pros

  • Customer Support has been outstanding for both students and faculty. Our dedicated reps are very responsive and proactive in touching base with users who have dropped off.
  • The student facing mobile app has gotten very strong reviews. With many of our PT students being working adult on the go, the ability to access study material such as flash cards via their smartphones has been very helpful and it shows it their grades vs sections that just use the hard copy book.
  • Importing content from Mindtap into an LMS like Blackboard is very easily done, everything is customizable and it integrates seamlessly with the course Grade Center. It also makes copying content from semester to semester very painless.

Cons

  • The biggest issue our first-time users have with Mindtap is that ad/pop-up blockers often stop the tool from opening. (Mindtap typically opens in a new window vs inside the LMS) This leads to a lot of initial frustration amongst the students early in the course.
  • MindTap lacks a really strong set of roles outside of Instructor and Student. There is no Teaching Assistant role or and IT/Course Builder role. Additionally setting up students workers as TAs in one course while they may be a student in another concurrently has been more than a little cumbersome.
  • The UI is a bit dated and it doesn't implement many responsive web design features, though this can typically be worked around by downloading the free app.
  • The mobile app experience is not as strong for Instructors as it is for students.

Likelihood to Recommend

Well first you have to have a textbook match, they have a pretty good library but I can only vouch for business and law courses. It can be very helpful for online students in remote areas who may have trouble getting a hold of the hardcopy textbook and as noted the mobile app/study features are a huge hit with PT students.

On the Instructional Design side, it can also be helpful to a Blackboard/HTML novice who either isn't comfortable building content within the LMS or doesn't have the time required to build out a full course.

MN
Mark Nowowiejski
Sr. Instructional Designer in Information Technology at Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality (10,001+ employees)
Vetted Review
Cengage MindTap
4 years of experience
View profile