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PowerSchool Student Information System has been widely praised by users for its ease of use and intuitive interface. Teachers, …
Overview
What is PowerSchool SIS?
The PowerSchool Student Information System covers administrative needs, such as scheduling, attendance, reporting, data management, faculty management, emergency/medical and health management, registration, and more for K-12 schools and districts. It is easy to use and boasts an industry-leading gradebook, PowerTeacher Pro. Users enjoy a fully…
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Demo showing PowerSchool Tuition Plugin
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Product Details
- About
- Competitors
- Tech Details
- Downloadables
- FAQs
What is PowerSchool SIS?
The PowerSchool Student
Information System covers administrative needs, such as scheduling, attendance,
reporting, data management, faculty management, emergency/medical and health
management, registration, and more for K-12 schools and districts. It is easy
to use and boasts an industry-leading gradebook, PowerTeacher Pro. Users enjoy
a fully web-based SIS that is flexible, configurable, and scalable with
real-time updates on any operating system, browser or device.
PowerSchool SIS Screenshots
PowerSchool SIS Videos
PowerSchool delivers innovative tools for the digital classroom
Customer testimonials
Customer testimonials
PowerSchool SIS Competitors
- Infinite Campus
- Skyward
- Aeries
PowerSchool SIS Technical Details
| Deployment Types | Software as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based |
|---|---|
| Operating Systems | Unspecified |
| Mobile Application | Apple iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Blackberry, Mobile Web |
| Supported Languages | Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Greek, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Vietnamese |
Frequently Asked Questions
Infinite Campus are common alternatives for PowerSchool SIS.
Reviewers rate Student Data Security and Class Scheduling highest, with a score of 9.4.
The most common users of PowerSchool SIS are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
PowerSchool SIS Customer Size Distribution
| Consumers | 0% |
|---|---|
| Small Businesses (1-50 employees) | 30% |
| Mid-Size Companies (51-500 employees) | 70% |
| Enterprises (more than 500 employees) | 0% |
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Reviews and Ratings
(70)
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!
- Business Problems Solved
- Pros
- Cons
PowerSchool Student Information System has been widely praised by users for its ease of use and intuitive interface. Teachers, administrators, students, and parents have found the program to be relatively easy to learn and navigate. With PowerSchool, users can access attendance records, record grades, create progress reports and report cards, enter and view demographics, and create seating arrangements. Additionally, teachers can easily enter assignments into the grade book and communicate due dates and assignment expectations to students and parents. The program also serves as a centralized location for student management and information storage, allowing for unified student histories and easy transfers between schools within a district or county. PowerSchool integrates seamlessly with other educational systems, enabling the sharing of data and account management. Overall, PowerSchool Student Information System streamlines administrative tasks, improves communication between all stakeholders, and enhances the overall management of student information.
Customizability: Users have praised PowerSchool Student Information System for its highly customizable nature, with multiple reviewers stating that they can create their own fields and tables to tailor the system to their specific needs. This flexibility allows them to efficiently manage and track student information in a way that aligns with their unique requirements.
Integration capabilities: Several users have expressed appreciation for PowerSchool's extensive list of partners, highlighting that it simplifies the process of managing student data across multiple platforms. Reviewers have mentioned that if users already use another system for student data, chances are high that it can integrate seamlessly with PowerSchool. This integration capability enhances efficiency and provides a seamless experience for users.
Strong support system: Multiple reviewers have commended PowerSchool's strong support system, emphasizing the quick response time from customer support. They mentioned rarely being put on hold when calling support and finding reliable assistance through active user forums. The responsive customer support offered by PowerSchool ensures that users receive timely help when needed, enhancing their overall experience with the software.
Lack of Intuitiveness: Several users have found PowerSchool to be unintuitive, making it difficult for them to navigate and find the features they need. Some reviewers mentioned that certain functions require programming knowledge, which can be a barrier for administrators who are not familiar with coding.
Slow Performance: Reviewers have reported slow page loads and sluggish performance when managing student data in PowerSchool. This issue has been mentioned by multiple users, indicating that it is a common concern. The slow speed can hamper productivity and frustrate users trying to complete tasks efficiently.
Limited Integration and External Access: Users have expressed frustration with the limited integration options available in PowerSchool. Some reviewers have specifically mentioned difficulty in integrating external platforms or accessing the database for external integrations. This lack of flexibility restricts users from seamlessly incorporating other tools or systems into their workflow, hindering efficiency and collaboration efforts.
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Reviews
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April 13, 2021
PowerSchool - Big but easy
PowerSchool SIS is the heart of the school district and is the master of the student data. It is used by everyone from administration to the classroom teacher. It handles registration, class schedules, attendance, grades, incident management and many more parts of the school ecosystem.
- Accurate student data repository
- easy to use teacher portal and gradebook
- Parent portal access to grades and alerts
- Access to the DB for external integrations
- Lengthy product suggestion implementation
- Downtime support
We use PowerSchool [Student Information System] to do grades and attendance. PowerSchool has acquired many different companies and has expanded their offerings to out price themselves for many small districts. PowerSchool is a strong leader in the SIS world, and teachers like using it. Administrators like it a little less than teachers, and our IT staff have a hard time with it, (teachers win) We have been with PowerSchool since 2000 and have seen it grow in to what it is today. They have over promised and under delivered student data added cost by creating more addons to which I would expect to be part of the core function. PowerSchool is customizable if you have the skills to do so and they are finally getting past some of the limitations of the databases it was on 20 years ago, I feel like they have put more effort in new addons and frills instead of improving and fixing the core product. They have used the money they get for maintenance to build other products instead of maintain the product we are paying for. It works well for teachers and students, and so we keep with them, but I feel they have much to improve on for me to be satisficed with their service and product.
- Student Grades
- Teacher Gradebook
- Parent Portal
- Course management
- Attendance
- State Reports
- Student Data Management
- Speed of Page loads are long
- Analysis of student information
- Contacts
March 16, 2021
PowerSchool - A Great Educational Resource
PowerSchool is used at our school by the entire organization. The teachers use it in the classroom for daily attendance, as the grading system and for classroom reports. The secretarial staff and guidance counselors use PowerSchool to track and report attendance, student personal information for grades and transcripts. PowerSchool addresses a one stop shopping learning management system. All the information that is needed can be located in one place and is able to do many different things by various people. The same information that is needed by teachers, administrators or counselors can be all accessed from the same place.
- Easy grading capabilities
- Attendance taking capabilities
- Reports
- More varieties of reporting
PowerSchool Student Information System is being used by our entire school district to manage student registration, classroom rosters, grading, reporting, communications, and more. This system integrates with a variety of other educational systems that we use for academic needs. Rosters from PowerSchool Student Information System are shared seamlessly with other platforms, allowing for smooth account management of all systems. We currently use PowerSchool Student Information System with Google, Canvas (our learning management system), Discovery Education, and Clever.
- What I like best about PowerSchool Student Information System is that you can use it as a very basic level (rosters, attendance, grades) or go to very deep levels of integration with other PowerSchool systems (registration, human resources, special education).
- The PowerSchool Student Information System support system is strong among current users of the product. There is a vibrant community of end users who are willing to help other users.
- Resources for self learning are abundant in the PowerSchool Student Information System Community site.
- What I don't like is that it sometimes too complex for the typical user.
- Secretaries live in PowerSchool Student Information System as part of their duties. Some of the knowledge necessary to get the most out of PowerSchool Student Information System requires some level of programming knowledge, which is beyond most secretaries' skill sets.
- As PowerSchool continues to purchase other platforms to expand their offerings, it is difficult to stay up to speed on all of the trainings.
- Bigger is not always better. Just because you can expand and offer features doesn't mean you should.
January 18, 2020
Gathering Information for Staff and Families
We use the PowerSchool Student Information System to collect student demographic data and apply grades and comments to families.
- PowerSchool Student Information System does a great job of organizing information.
- PowerSchool Student Information System has smooth grading processes.
- It is not intuitive to know all the shortcuts and system tools.
- Training takes multiple days to get comfortable.
January 17, 2020
PowerSchool SIS is Great!
PowerSchool SIS is being used by our entire organization. It addresses many issues for us, as it allows us to do attendance, track grades and leave comments for report cards. It also allows us to have all our information in one place, like parent information, where they live and what their IEP or 504s are.
- It allows me to find all my students information in one place.
- It calculates all my grades for me and weights it so I do not have to do extra work.
- Sometimes I struggle to find the correct classes because I am not able to change the names that my school put in.
- I sometimes cannot easily locate information I am trying to find.
December 20, 2019
PowerSchool Student Information System is a Win, Win
PowerSchool Student Information System is being used by my entire school system to keep track of student demographics, scheduling, grades, and special education IEP files. By having all this information in one place, our record-keeping is effectively streamlined.
- Scheduling is easy.
- The gradebook is convenient and easy to use.
- Sometimes setting up the gradebook can be tricky.
December 18, 2019
Educator gives PowerSchool A+
Floyd County School System in Rome, GA uses PowerSchool to take attendance, see birthdays, rosters, input grades and take lunch orders in the cafeteria. It is incredibly user intuitive and only takes my fellow teachers and me a few minutes to put in grades. At my old school, we used another much more complicated and difficult system. PowerSchool has made my life as a teacher so much easier.
- Ease of Use: the menu is very straight forward and easy to navigate through.
- Mobile site/App: I appreciate that there’s a mobile version of the site as well as the app so I can input grades from my smartphone on the go.
- When going to the GA LDS site for our TKES performance review, we don’t get an email like we used to (when the system was not through PowerSchool) when our administrator fills out a document we need to complete.
- I wish it were linked to my email and reminders for inputting grades could be set up on a certain day each month to send me an email reminding of when they’re due.
December 17, 2019
Best-in-Class SIS that will take you well into the future!
We use PowerSchool as the master source for all student data. We also use it for managing state reporting data. We have found that it is very customizable and can be tailored to house the data we need. We have 2 school districts, and it is used by both. It allows us to keep all data in a single location to best manage the quality of our data. Importing and exporting data and automating those processes has been invaluable, as we have connected PowerSchool to our state testing system, therefore our roster within other systems is accurate, even when a new student is enrolled.
- PowerSchool SIS has made reporting much easier. The ability for us to have instant reports for our administrator is very important, but the ability to pull the raw data and customize our own reports is crucial.
- Tracking attendance is very important as we have truancy issues in our district and often have to provide documentation for court. It is very easy to track, print reports and customize our attendance codes.
- The good is that PowerSchool is easy to use, the ugly is that you will need a dedicated person if you ever want to do a lot of customizations. So someone with a basic technical knowledge of relational databases is key to getting your money's worth out of PowerSchool. Frequently we need additional reports not already offered in PowerSchool, so we have someone that is familiar with sql that can create them inside of PowerSchool.
- The built-in report card module for standards based report cards has always been my biggest disappointment. It's not that it's not there, it's just that you need someone with a programming mentality to be able to make a nice clean report. And changes are tedious and time-consuming to make.
Our school district utilizes PowerSchool throughout the district. It is our primary data hub for all student information including demographics, grades, attendance, and discipline. Every department in the school uses PowerSchool including, teachers, students, administrators, business office, and nurses.
PowerSchool addresses all of our student data needs. We have to collect and manage an enormous amount of student data and PowerSchool offers the ability to handle all of our student data needs.
PowerSchool addresses all of our student data needs. We have to collect and manage an enormous amount of student data and PowerSchool offers the ability to handle all of our student data needs.
- Manage demographic data to help us manage constantly changing state reporting requirements.
- Provide an excellent Gradebook for teachers that provides instant sync of grades to both the PowerSchool database and parent apps.
- At this time I wish PowerSchool would do a better job in attendance tracking. The current system works without errors, but can be cumbersome with the amount of data available.
- Uploading standardized test scores is also cumbersome. It can be done but takes some time to complete, and we had to create custom screens for people to be able to utilize that data effectively.
December 28, 2018
Praise for PowerSchool SIS
PowerSchool Student Information System is being used across our entire organization. To a degree, different levels of education and departments cater their usage to their needs, but the general uses are the same across our organization.
We use PowerSchool SIS to log and track student grade, to take attendance, store and log student information, email students and parents, generate grade reports, and to make due dates and assignment expectations clear to students and parents. Students have student access and parents have their own access to track grades and assignments as well.
PowerSchool could be described as "the glue" that holds together many of the logistical details in education. It would be nearly impossible to do our jobs without it.
We use PowerSchool SIS to log and track student grade, to take attendance, store and log student information, email students and parents, generate grade reports, and to make due dates and assignment expectations clear to students and parents. Students have student access and parents have their own access to track grades and assignments as well.
PowerSchool could be described as "the glue" that holds together many of the logistical details in education. It would be nearly impossible to do our jobs without it.
- Intuitive to use - Many of the features are those that you would easily be able to easily use simply by testing them out
- Comprehensive Student information-- PowerSchool is the one tool needed to view, log, and track student and parent information. Everything from student birthdays to their individualized educational needs can be logged and tracked in PowerSchool. This makes it very easy for multiple teachers and school personnel to be aware of what students need to be successful.
- Multiple functions-- PowerSchool tracks attendance, holds/creates seating charts, has a "gradebook" for teachers, provides many options to make the gradebook authentic and specific according to the content one is teaching, provides the ability to send out mass emails to students and/or parents, and much more.
- Gradebook Application quits or times out sometimes -- The GradeBook portion of PowerSchool will sometimes randomly quit as I am putting in grades. Although I can easily log back in, it can be a nuisance to deal with this.
November 21, 2018
PowerSchool offers a customizable platform for K-12 schools to manage student information in a way that all stakeholders can utilize.
I work for a school district located in a rural area with three schools - elementary, middle, and high school. We use PowerSchool Student Information System in all of our schools to keep track of our students for many things such as grades, attendance, demographics, contact information, etc. It acts as an electronic file of everything we need to store on our students.
Because PowerSchool holds so much information on our students that we can sort and download specific information electronically to use in different ways. For example, if I purchase an online assessment or program that requires student names and grade levels to be entered into their system, I am able to easily export the information from PowerSchool in a CSV file that can be uploaded into the online assessment or program. This saves me hours of time and allows us to begin using the assessment or program sooner.
Because PowerSchool holds so much information on our students that we can sort and download specific information electronically to use in different ways. For example, if I purchase an online assessment or program that requires student names and grade levels to be entered into their system, I am able to easily export the information from PowerSchool in a CSV file that can be uploaded into the online assessment or program. This saves me hours of time and allows us to begin using the assessment or program sooner.
- PowerSchool houses student or staff information that can be easily accessed by those teachers and administrators who need the information. This allows everyone to go to one place to access information.
- Parents can view their child's grades at any time with their protected login on a parent portal. This allows teachers to keep parents informed and involved in their child's progress at school. When everyone works together it increases our students' chance for success.
- PowerSchool offers videos to train new users. When we have new employees, the videos can be accessed at any time the employee needs as opposed to them waiting for someone to help them.
- It would be great if PowerSchool had an alert pop-up for teachers when they use an assignment category that is not set up in Final Grade Calculation. As it is, if a teacher used an assignment category that is not set up, they cannot print a report card.
- PowerScheduler does not work for our secondary schools because we have limited classes available. We would love a solution that could help with this.
November 18, 2018
Wonderful Product Review
PowerSchool is the SIS for our student data. It is the central hub for student and teacher data to satisfy the requirements for educational reporting to the state and federal levels. It is being used by our administrators, teachers, parents and students. It helps the parents stay abreast of all the information on their students.
- Web based solutions running a very reliable oracle database.
- Very user-friendly.
- It has a very strong support team!
- The state reporting is written to the specs of our department o0f education with makes reports easy.
- They are improving it every day by staying on top of the ever changing technology world!
- Again it is very user-friendly so it is hard to say that is hard to use.
- Don't change a thing!
November 18, 2018
PowerSchool SiS-continued growth
PowerSchool is an integral part of our school community. We use it to house student information and for grading purposes. The ease of use for both end users and administrators is an asset. For a sysadmin, the support community is a lifesaver as well.
- Excellent searchability for locating student information
- Compatibility with other systems is a major asset
- Highly customizable for storing unique information needed in a non-public school
- Roll out of new features sometimes needs debugging first
- Responsiveness support has become slightly more difficult with the increase in the clientele of the product
- Rapid expansion of the company over the last 12-24 months has resulted in some issues
November 08, 2018
PowerSchool Student Information System
We are a K-12 public school district currently using PowerSchool as our primary Student Information System. It houses all student and parent contact information, grades and transcript information, discipline information, and attendance information. We also have it connected to other products which extend the capabilities of PowerSchool. It addresses our need to maintain and report accurate digital records for students.
- Clean and user-friendly user interface that works in any web browser
- Solid partners that sell additional products to extend the core functionality of PowerSchool
- Offers the ability to customize the interface with basic HTML and SQL syntax
- Although it houses a lot of data, extracting that data often requires the use of data export and manipulation tools or writing SQL queries so only the technically-minded can do it
- Core functionality missing: digital report cards in the Parent/Student portal/app
- Support is hit-or-miss with low response time or a knowledgeable representative
November 08, 2018
PowerSchool - Solid and Flexible
We use PowerSchool SIS across the entire school for managing student demographics, parents, emergency and other student contacts, assignments and grades, schedules, attendance, discipline and medical alerts as well as special education needs. All our teachers use the integrated grade book. Parents and students have access to see grades, assignments and due dates through a parent/student portal or an app, which has eliminated the need for printed report cards.
- PowerSchool is highly customizable. We are able to create any field or table that is not part of the stock product.
- PowerSchool's list of partners is extensive. If you use any other system for information relating to student data, chances are that they will be able to integrate with PowerSchool
- Whenever I call Support, only rarely have I been put on hold. My call normally goes straight through to a support person.
- There are also several very active user forums. I have had many questions answered through one of those.
- The user interface could be more intuitive. Because of the many features, it can sometimes be difficult for administrators to find what they are looking for.
- A recent upgrade allowing for more flexibility in the relationship between students and parents was long in coming and didn't go very smoothly. We are now dealing with a ton of clean-up after the upgrade. Even after we have cleaned everything up, there is still a ways to go before PowerSchool is on par with other SIS systems in that area. In their defense though, they are actively working on getting caught up.
March 21, 2018
PowerSchool? Power cool!
PowerSchool Student Information System is being used by my entire organization in one way or another. It is solving a myriad of problems/issues for my organization. With PowerSchool, my school is able to take and access attendance records, record grades by using the grade book feature, create progress reports along with report cards, enter and look at demographics school-wide and per student/class, enter comments into the progress and report cards, create seating arrangements for each class we teach, enter in assignments into the grade book and have them weighted by category or by curriculum standards. PowerSchool is taking many different separate items that both teachers and administrators have to complete or deal with on a daily basis, and puts them in one place, making things easy and accessible to everyone, including parents and students as well.
- It allows teachers to add in formative and sumative assignments into their grade book with ease
- It allows for easy attendance taking
- It allows for quick reference of students performance not only in your class, but in others as well.
- The function to enter in comments on report cards could be easier to access.
- I think there should be a function to re-use weights for categories ( e.g. classwork, homework, quizzes. etc.) that you have previously used for classes.
- After assigning the same assignment for multiple classes, if you have taken the shortcut to create them by simply filling out the information on the assignment form and then clicking on multiple classes grade books for it to be added to, if you then decide not to give said assignment to one of the classes you chose, you cannot only delete the assignment from that class, the system will delete the assignments from every class!
PowerSchool Student Information System is used throughout the school. It is used by teachers, administrators, students, and parents. The program is used to house students personal/home information, which allows their school team members to effectively communicate with their given family members. This information is updated by the guidance department or an administrator. PowerSchool Student Information System also provides detailed school information, including grades, attendance, GPA, as well as behavior and communication logs for given school members with administrative logins. The school information is updated by guidance, administrators, as well as classroom teachers.
Students, parents, and support personnel are able to view information but are unable to make any changes within the system. The only time students are able to make edits are during course selection time, where they work within a specific page and submit their requests for the following years classes. The most beneficial part of the PowerSchool Student Information System is for students, parents, and support personnel to view the student's updated grades, which include grades for specific assessments and assignments, as well as missing work.
Students, parents, and support personnel are able to view information but are unable to make any changes within the system. The only time students are able to make edits are during course selection time, where they work within a specific page and submit their requests for the following years classes. The most beneficial part of the PowerSchool Student Information System is for students, parents, and support personnel to view the student's updated grades, which include grades for specific assessments and assignments, as well as missing work.
- Having one linked system for student information including grades, data, attendance, etc., linked up to the grade-book (Power Teacher Pro) is very convenient for teachers.
- PowerSchool allows support staff, administration, parents, and students to all view overall grades as well as detailed information. This is a nice feature so that all members of a student's team can be on the same page, especially when there are missing assignments.
- PowerSchool has the feature to alert parents when students are absent from a class. Parents can check student's attendance at any time, but also can be alerted.
- While administrators have the ability to view schedules in a format that is easy to view, students and teachers are unable to have a yearlong or trimester long schedule that is printer friendly.
- The view available for looking back on attendance is not user-friendly. The grid per block is hard to read on both the screen and after being printed.
- As a teacher, there is no place within PowerSchool to document communication with students or parents. Having a log would be a nice feature so that there is a record and other staff members could see the history of communication.
November 09, 2017
PowerSchool Student Information System Review
PowerSchool is being used by the entire Catholic School to manage student demographic information, classes, registration, and grades. We have even expanded it out to now use PowerSchool's Learning Management System. It is a daily tool that is the center of how we keep and manage the abundance of our student information.
- User Friendly for both our students and staff.
- Very customizable, and supported by a lot of other vendors/services.
- Solid performance.
- Has shown to be very secure, and is trusted by families.
- Sales department could be better.
- Some features or settings can be hidden.
- Installing certain services can require a complex series of steps, and things are sometimes not very intuitive.