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Schoology Learning

Schoology Learning

Overview

What is Schoology Learning?

Schoology aims to combine as many parts of the learning process as possible into a single platform for K-12 students. By doing this they aim to simplify the learning experience for students, parents, and teachers.

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

Schoology is a versatile Learning Management System used by school districts, educators, and students to enhance the learning experience …
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Quick unbiased view of Schoology

10 out of 10
May 16, 2020
Our school uses Schoology as a Learning Management System. As teachers we submit our lesson plans on there. We use the resources to store …
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 11 features
  • Course authoring (38)
    7.7
    77%
  • Assignments (40)
    6.8
    68%
  • Mobile friendly (38)
    6.6
    66%
  • Learning reporting & analytics (37)
    6.0
    60%

Reviewer Pros & Cons

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Pricing

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Schoology Basic

Free

Cloud

Schoology Enterprise

Contact sales team

Cloud

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://www.schoology.com/sign-up-now

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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Features

Learning Management

Features of LMS and LCMS systems, related to designing, administering, and consuming learning content in an educational, corporate, or on-the-job context.

7.3
Avg 8.2
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Product Details

What is Schoology Learning?

Schoology, now a PowerSchool Unified Classroom product, is a learning management system (LMS). Schoology’s platform is built specifically for the needs of K-12 students, teachers, and administrators. Schoology aims to combine as many parts of the learning process as possible into a single platform. By doing this they aim to simplify the learning experience for students, parents, and teachers.

The Basic Package is free for instructors and includes features such as an Academic Activity Dashboard, Instructional Tools, and a Native Document Grader. The Enterprise Package includes the Basic Package and additional features such as Systemwide Administration, User Management, and Workload Planning.

PowerSchool acquired Schoology in late 2019.


Overview of Schoology Features

Schoology focuses on student mastery of learning objectives by offering a proficiency model of grading and traditional numeric grades. Through their online platform, it is simple to deliver assessments to students regardless of their location. Assessments are flexible and can be quick quizzes, locally-created benchmarks, or district-wide assessments.


Through Schoology’s built-in data and analytics, educators can determine what is working and what is not at several different levels. The reports generated give information at both the class and school level and can be used by teachers to determine how their students are doing, as well as administrators to ensure that all students school-wide are on track. Reports can be shared via a secure URL, and access is filtered based on staff permissions

Schoology aims to ensure effective communication between parents and educators. Teachers can send weekly digests about classroom activities. Parents can instantly access their students' grades to get an idea of their child’s full learning experience.

Per the vendor, Schoology is easy to use in combination with other learning tools and comes with over 200 native integrations. Educators can use said tools to quickly create assignments. Courses can be built from scratch, or educators can use Schoology’s content library that contains over 300 applications. Courses can be easily shared with other teachers or can be re-used across multiple academic years.

Collaboration is encouraged between teachers through the Public Groups pages on Schoology. These are community pages where educators can share ideas, ask questions and learn from each other.


Tailored Education Solutions

Schoology aims to create a highly tailored educational experience for students that ensures that they meet learning objectives in the way that works best for them. By offering personalized pacing, students can work through the material at the speed that suits their individual needs.

Educators also have the option of creating lessons that give students a choice in how they learn the material. Students can select the tasks that suit their learning style, and a grade for that lesson appears in the grade book, regardless of which task was selected.

Schoology also emphasizes the importance of collaboration between students, even in a remote learning environment. The Groups feature allows students to communicate and store resources about sports, clubs, etc. outside of their course modules.


Schoology Learning Features

Learning Management Features

  • Supported: Course authoring
  • Supported: Course catalog or library
  • Supported: Learning content
  • Supported: Assignments
  • Supported: Learning administration
  • Supported: Learning reporting & analytics
  • Supported: eLearning
  • Supported: Assessments
  • Supported: Live online learning
  • Supported: In-person learning
  • Supported: Video learning
  • Supported: Social learning

Schoology Learning Screenshots

Screenshot of Example of Schoology’s course dashboard.

Schoology Learning Video

What is Schoology?

Schoology Learning Technical Details

Deployment TypesSoftware as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationNo

Frequently Asked Questions

Schoology aims to combine as many parts of the learning process as possible into a single platform for K-12 students. By doing this they aim to simplify the learning experience for students, parents, and teachers.

Canvas, Edmodo, and Google Classroom are common alternatives for Schoology Learning.

Reviewers rate Learning content highest, with a score of 9.1.

The most common users of Schoology Learning are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(146)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

Schoology is a versatile Learning Management System used by school districts, educators, and students to enhance the learning experience and streamline communication. Teachers rely on Schoology to create and share resources, post assignments, and assess student progress. It also serves as a platform for coordinating school groups, athletic activities, and building school culture. With Schoology, educators can easily communicate with families, manage events and assignments, collect feedback, generate discussions, and facilitate formal assessments. Students benefit from Schoology by accessing course materials, assignments, study materials, and participating in interactive class discussions. Parents appreciate the platform's ability to keep them informed about their child's progress through regular updates and messages from teachers. Additionally, Schoology has been widely adopted by entire school districts as their preferred LMS due to its effectiveness in addressing differentiation, collaboration, and communication needs. Beyond the classroom, Schoology is also utilized by organizations for professional development, communication, collaboration, and training purposes. Overall, Schoology offers a user-friendly interface that simplifies the transition to paperless classrooms while providing valuable tools for both educators and students alike.

Users commonly recommend the following actions when using Schoology as an LMS:

  1. Experiment and customize: Users suggest taking the time to learn how to use Schoology effectively, exploring its various capabilities, and customizing it to meet specific needs. They recommend creating a committee to evaluate Schoology or any other LMS and piloting Schoology with real students before fully implementing it. It is also recommended to build a customized course in Schoology, utilizing features such as videos and modified LMS settings to enhance engagement.

  2. Integrate with other tools: Users find it beneficial to integrate Schoology with other tools like Office 365 or Google Classroom. They recommend exploring Schoology's integration capabilities with platforms like PowerSchool and Google Drive. Some users mention that Schoology seamlessly integrates with products like Kami, enhancing the overall user experience.

  3. Organize and communicate effectively: Users appreciate Schoology's features for organizing classes and sharing information among instructors. They suggest utilizing the platform's folders feature and announcements for easy organization and communication within the learning environment. Archiving courses for future use is also recommended. Additionally, users find that keeping educational resources organized in one place makes it easily accessible to students.

Overall, users recommend taking the time to familiarize oneself with Schoology's features, explore integrations with other tools, and leverage its organizational capabilities for effective online teaching and learning experiences.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-4 of 4)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
Philip Pulley | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 3 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Fieldcrest currently uses Schoology as a district wide Learning Management System (LMS). We switched to Schoology last year and I use Schoology for almost all of my course work. I teach using the flipped classroom model and Schoology's platform allows me to share my lecture videos, conduct assessments of student knowledge and understanding, to give assignments, and to provide communication with students and parents. All of my content is available to my students through Schoology 24/7, I can make it available in a variety of ways, and I can make updates in real time. Recently, Schoology's introduction of the Google Assignment App has me excited about our switch to Chromebooks. This app allows you to attach a Google Doc (say a study guide) as part of an assignment. When students open the assignment the document is copied, renamed, and added to their Google Drive. No more students opening or copying a new version of the document each time they go back to the assignment instead of to the copy they made but didn't actually rename like the directions stated. The document is 'tied' to the assignment and updates no matter where they work on it from (inside the assignment or through their Google Drive.) Still to come, a cleaner looking interface with differentiation for elementary students!
  • Google Assignment App - this is a game changer for schools using Google and Chromebooks but grading is a scrolling nightmare for teachers and not intuitive.
  • Open LMS - it integrates with outside apps and programs but they have done little to improve the functionality of the product.
  • New interfaces on the way - a cleaner look for all and an elementary version of the interface. This took YEARS longer than promised and looks completely different. They updated the user interface (UI) again for other users and now have some icons used for different features.
  • More question types coming for assessments including labeling. These are now available, but the promised equity with the old assessment feature has never happened. New users only get the new assessment and while it looks nice, it lacks many basic features and is a grading nightmare.
  • Options are available for assessment monitoring for schools and districts. All third-party paid apps unless you have Chromebooks.
  • Microsoft OneDrive Integration and Assignments.
  • Google Drive Integration
  • So many promised features have not been added as promised. Flaws in existing features have not been (and based on my experience with the highest levels of support and development) never will be.
  • Grading Google Drive Assignments is a scrolling nightmare. Assessments that have short answer/essay questions do not show up on your list of things that need to be graded.
  • Known pain points for teachers are never addressed. Support since they were bought by PowerSchool has become nothing but, "Huh, we will escalate that" and then escalated, then escalated again, then to the top level and nothing happens.
  • Updates to fix issues, forget about it. If you look at their roadmap for Schoology, it is all about integration with other products PowerSchool owns. Nothing on the roadmap was about fixing anything in Schoology outside of a new UI which simply changed the look slightly.
  • I wish I could move and resize pop-up editing boxes. I create complex and visual landing pages with hyperlinks for my students. I wish that box were able to be made bigger and many pop-up boxes cover information on the page that would be helpful when working in the box.
  • Settings and due dates for assessments are in two completely different places when creating them. One is in a tab in the content area, the other is in the creation "gear" menu. If both are not set correctly, your assessment will not work.
I'm a bit of a cynic; almost nothing is perfect, I supported Schoology, was an Ambassador, and Ambassador of the Year. However, my opinion of Schoology has changed since PowerchoolS bought it. Schoology no longer continues to work to become better and user-friendly. From a full 1:1 district to use by an individual instructor, there are multitudes of uses for Schoology. Some may think an LMS is not useful for the elementary level, but with its Google integration, Schoology provides a way to share Google or Microsoft content with students and to get content from them. For middle school to secondary, all content and assessments can be managed through Schoology in traditional, blended, or fully online environments. For elementary, a new interface is in the works geared to those levels, but basic course materials can be shared and housed in the system. Additionally, its ability to integrate apps and LTI content within its framework means improved ease of use for all students as they can stay within Schoology while accessing content outside of the platform. Assessment options are not increasing and those features are now only available with the additional $$ assessment management platform (AMP).
Learning Management (11)
60.90909090909091%
6.1
Course authoring
50%
5.0
Course catalog or library
50%
5.0
Player/Portal
90%
9.0
Learning content
60%
6.0
Mobile friendly
70%
7.0
Progress tracking & certifications
80%
8.0
Assignments
50%
5.0
Compliance management
100%
10.0
Learning administration
20%
2.0
Learning reporting & analytics
50%
5.0
Social learning
50%
5.0
  • Update: the changes to Schoology since PowerSchool bought them have been minimal and several features have been taken away. Support is hardly worth creating a ticket.
  • The administration and counselors are also utilizing the platform.
  • More parents are accessing their student's coursework and communicating through Schoology that in the past.
  • For us, more staff members are using Schoology than with our old LMS.
Schoology no longer provides all of the features of Canvas for a lower cost. In fact, as someone who now uses both LMSs, at different jobs, I can no longer recommend Schoology as features are disappearing and support has become almost worthless.
500
Elementary, middle and high school staff.
2
Only one is a classroom teacher with actual knowledge of how to use Schoology.
  • Courses
  • Groups
  • Some communication
  • Limited to no professional development use.
  • None.
  • Poor training has resulted in under utilization.
  • Hopefully for professional development.
Only because switching would mean big upfront cost from whatever new platform is chosen. It is if they don't fix problems because they know it is hard to switch.
Yes
My Big Campus. Lightspeed stopped MBC.
  • Integration with Other Systems
Except that is does not sync with either of the SISs we have had.
Initally, I picked a different option. I did support them, became a Schoology Champion, then an Ambassador, and even Ambassador of the year. Since PowerSchool bought them...I can't recommend.
  • Online Training
Too surface level with no follow-up. A
Sit and get with very little hands-on time. 5 minutes to try out a feature/question type, etc. is not enough time. Once your training is done, there is no option for new employees to get that training without having to rebook and pay for the training again. If you pay for basic training, that should be available to a district to use in the future.
Since they were bought by PowerSchool, with a promise to have more funding for support and development, things have gone in the opposite direction. Support tickets can't get solved so they get escalated multiple times until they hit the development team. Then nothing happens. No follow-up, no follow-through. Users had been looking forward to the day that the Assessment feature has full feature parity with the Test/Quiz feature but it is clear now that this will never happen. Also, any problems do not get addressed.
No. We are a small, rural district. The platform is expense enough.
Yes
Almost never.
Since the last long-time head of support left, no. They used to even help me help other districts with problems, but while they listen and agree something needs to be addressed or fixed, nothing ever happens anymore.
Features have been taken away and while some of the new options (Google Drive Assignments, OneDrive Assignments, and the new question types in Assessments) are nice, they come with functionality issues that Schoology/PS acknowledge but never fix.
  • Basic, simple assignments except the button to begin is labeled "Submit"
  • Updates/Announcements
  • Grading Google Drive Assignments
  • Item Banks - so many issues
  • Grading - Assessments with short anwer questions do not show up on your "Needs Grading" list
Yes
I rarely use it outside of sending an update/announcement. It is clunky and looks nothing like the online version.
We use it 5-12 so scalability is not an issue but sharing materials between departments including common assessments is difficult without paying for add-on features.
Generally good, but issue self-reporting has become a problem. When there are issues, it can be 20 minutes to an hour before it gets noted on the status page.
Course saves or transfers can take several minutes and up to an hour.
This was 7 years ago. Like most vendors, they promise a lot and at first, mostly followed through. We had a great working relationship with both the support and training staff. However, since their acquisition by PowerSchool that has all gone downhill. Training is still okay but mostly limited to sit-and-get-training. Support has gone completely downhill, so much so that it is almost not even worth putting in a support ticket.
Again, this was good prior to the PowerSchool buyout. We used to get input and even see results from that input. Now, it is "that's a good idea, put it in the portal." Which is rarely looked at and is considered by users who have used the product for more that a couple of years as being the place good ideas go to die.
Melissa Stanton | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Schoology is currently being used across the entire district. We are a one to one district with iPads in grades K-8 and laptops at the high school level. Schoology is the learning management system that I am using as a teacher to distribute and gather assignments from my students.
  • Schoology allows for personalized instruction of materials for students without others knowing that someone is getting something different.
  • Allows students without a voice (too scared to speak in the classroom) an opportunity to share their thoughts and ideas.
  • Opens communication for all students,
  • From a management aspect, I create on the web but my students are using the app. The amazing feature of using badges is not accessible from the app. I believe that this will be coming in the future. Our workaround is to log into the web version to see the badges.
  • When able to individualize instruction I want the ability to give an entire folder to a specific students. Currently at this point I do not have that ability.
Any school that is one to one should be using a learning management system. It cleans up the clutter and allows all students to be able to access their materials without fear of losing them.
  • Specifically in my classroom, when I first rolled out Schoology I had 8 students in reading (students with special needs) all 8 of them passed the state reading test.
Schoology was easier to navigate, students liked the look of the layout and were able to figure the app out quickly.
200
We use Schoology as our LMS in all 3 of our buildings. As a middle school teacher for students with special needs, I want my students to gain independence, become a self advocate for themselves and also learn to the best of their ability. Schoology has given me the tools to give all of these to my students.
3
Schoology is super easy to support the people around me. I do not have a background in technology and everything I have done on Schoology has been self taught. On the times when I needed assistance, I have had great success using their support pages for additional help.
  • Students have access to their materials 24 hours a day 7 days a week. There is a transparency for the parents to know what is going on in their children's classrooms.
  • Teacher organization....no more piles of papers, lost papers, trying to figure out the handwriting or "just what is this substance on the paper."
  • Students are mobile and like to have their information at their fingertips.
  • I use Schoology to track IEP goals.
  • Creativity and freedom of project choice for student voice.
  • Classroom management with MEDIA ALBUMS
  • I would love to see information posted on Schoology for our staff meetings.
  • Book Study for teachers and other staff
  • Increase involvement for parents with students in sports.
The ease of use for both parents, teachers and students. Having everything at your fingertips to nice to be able to get the information. I would love from a teacher persepective to have the ability to assign a folder to students individually like I can with the assignments.
No
We were 1 to 1 iPads and had no way to contain, give or get the information to students or parents. We tried a few options and none of them seemed what we wanted,.
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
As a classroom teacher for students with special needs, I needed a program that was easy for us to move around in, allow my students to have some independence and also become more organized. Schoology allowed for this to happen.
If I had to do it over, I would have created or found a checklist of the items we needed our LMS to be able to do. I also would have suggested that others try it out in more of a pilot program (maybe we would have more early teacher buy in)
Robert Schuetz | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Schoology is used by THSD-211 primarily to augment classroom learning activities; assessment, feedback, grading, and communication among others. Schoology is also used to support professional learning, connect students with other learners, and engage parents and advisors in learning processes. Extracurricular teams and clubs use Schoology Groups to communicate and engage participants in relevant activities. Schoology serves as the learning hub for our organization. Students and teachers use Schoology to improve their digital executive functioning, and as a focal point of their personal learning environments.
  • Schoology is an easy-to-learn, effective learning management system. It is particularly good at allowing teachers to provide blended, and individualized learning experiences.
  • Schoology's open API allows flexibility, and adaptability for both the user and the organization. It is intended to accommodate and integrate, existing tools, not replace them.
  • Schoology provides opportunities for learners, young and older, to extend learning beyond the time and space constraints of the traditional classroom.
  • Schoology's learning communities are enthusiastic, generous, and collaborative.
  • The "look" or appearance of Schoology is improving, but there is still room to improve the look and function of Schoology.
  • I would like to see more capabilities for users to customize their Schoology experience. In particular, being able customize the features tied to the user's profile.
  • Schoology could provide additional "help" options when hovering over buttons.
Schoology is very accommodating to a variety of settings and users. I suspect Schoology is better suited to upper grades and higher education than early primary grades. I can also see Schoology being used by businesses to support training programs, and collaborative projects. Personally, I am interested in learning more about ways in which Schoology can support global learning activities.
  • The scale and use of Schoology has grown with our district. Schoology has supported our 1:1 implementation which is a substantial investment by our district.
  • Schoology has made many of our classroom and school-based operations more efficient and effective.
  • Moving services to the cloud has save expense on technology and support.
The learning curve for Schoology is substantially less dramatic than other products. Schoology's mobile platform is more robust, and better supports the devices most frequently used by our learners. Schoology has greater functionality, and more classroom management features than other LMS products. Schoology's open API offers greater opportunity for the product to evolve with the needs of the user, and the organization.
20000
Schoology is the learning management system used by our teachers, their students, and their parents. Administrator counselors, coaches, and club sponsors also use Schoology to keep students and community members connected and engaged with school activities.
7
The skills needed to support our Schoology use include basic trouble shooting of web applications and iOS applications, data upload and management, and working knowledge of the easy-to-use LMS features.
  • Provide a digital hub to keep learners connected and engaged in school activities.
  • Provide a digital workflow solution for teachers and their students.
  • Provide a communication portal for students and their parents.
  • Provide students with ubiquitous access to courses and activities.
  • Provide a coherent information center to share announcements and information.
  • Deliver school-wide, class-wide, or individual messages.
  • Offer a self-paced, online digital citizenship course to our students.
  • Host virtual meetings with parents and community members.
  • Because Schoology is expanding globally, it will provide an avenue for students and teachers to connect and learn with others around the world.
  • Schoology's recent enhancements will allow greater personalization for delivering content and assessing learning.
  • Schoology can be used to create and share digital portfolios showing the longitudinal processes and evidence of learning.
While we have taken time to re-evaluate our selected 1:1 devices, Schoology's impact on student learning is unquestioned. Students are able to connect with other learners, create and share products of their learning, and develop their digital fluency through their use of Schoology.
No
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
  • Product Reputation
Factors that impacted our selection of Schoology include; ease of use, flexibility and growth, and support.
We wouldn't change a thing. Grassroots interest and usage of Schoology moved us from 2 to 35 to 15,000 users in one calendar year.
Vicky Creasy, EdD | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Schoology as a platform for our teachers to host courses. Many of our teachers use it for quizzes and tests so that they don't have to grade by hand any more. Teachers host notes and other documents so that we save paper and students no longer have to lose items at home. Our sports coaches host their notes as well for their teams on their own course sites on our Schoology platform. We also have departments set up to use Schoology for PLCs. We have even begun hosting principal videos on principal "courses" where principals can put important documents and then post videos as needed to save teachers the time that they used to have to stay for afternoon meetings!
  • We love being able to copy courses from semester to semester so that we don't have to redo all of the work each semester.
  • Schoology is really easy to learn, there's not much training needed for new users.
  • The platform is really fun for students to use.
  • We would like to be able to tie the gradebook in with our current gradebook.
  • We don't like the attendance feature.
We absolutely love Schoology. I think it's one of the best LMS products on the market. It looks like Facebook, so students and teachers WANT to jump in and use it. It's super easy to jump in and figure out. It allows copying of courses from semester to semester, so your work is worthwhile. Tech support is very friendly and accommodating. We have been so happy with our decision. I wouldn't change to anything else.
  • We've saved a fortune in paper - teachers and students rarely print anything any more.
  • Teachers love that they never have to grade manual papers for quizzes and tests, they are saving so much time.
I felt that Moodle was way too hard for teachers to learn. We tried Moodle for a while, but the difficulty level was much higher than schoology, and the friendly "face" of the look of the platform never was the same as schoology. I loved the look of schoology. The way that it looked like Facebook gave students the desire to pick it up and run with it!
Yes
We replaced Moodle. Moodle was too complicated for our teachers, and not many were actually using it. Once we found Schoology, it seemed like a no-brainer. It required little to no training, and our teachers AND students could pick it up and start using it immediately.
  • Price
  • Product Features
  • Product Usability
  • Product Reputation
The biggest thing I considered was usability and long term reliability. I wanted something I could trust to be around. I didn't want to have teachers invest in building courses on a platform that was going to disappear.
I am not sure that I would have done anything differently. Luckily I was able to attend ISTE and see many different products and evaluate them. I also was able to sample different products and have test platforms to see what we liked and didn't like. I gave teachers sample classrooms for a month or two to play around with so that they could give feedback as well.
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