A Realistic Review of Blackbaud's "On" Products
Updated May 12, 2021
A Realistic Review of Blackbaud's "On" Products
Score 1 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Blackbaud Education Management Solutions
We use the entire "On" suite. It is being used across our entire school. We are able to have our teachers use it for their teacher web pages, parents use it for the directory and to see student information, we use it for events and for prospective parents. We send out pushpages or e-communications to all our constituencies. We also integrate other databases for our nurses database through Schooldoc and Titan HST.
- The "front end" marketing side of the site is great with its mobile-friendly platform. The site looks very professional, yet student-centered.
- Behind the password, class pages are informative and students can have access to their homework and schedules.
- The site is there for parents to login and access information that they need from the school at their fingertips.
- Parents have access to a school online directory and can assess parent-related links, resources, photos, and class inforation
- The entire On record module needs immense improvement. It's extremely clunky and hasn't been updated in ages. It's an afterthought.
- The event registration piece is not mobile friendly. We have had tons of issues with people having problems signing up for events on their phones.
- The reporting and lists functions can be clunky and difficult to execute.
- The front-end of the site has been our best tool for marketing. And the new interface does make it easier for me to make changes on the back-end.
- Editing student profiles and more "find" features have made things a little bit easier to navigate.
- Finalsite
Blackbaud K-12 is very similar. I feel like I would be trading one set of issues for another so it's kind of a wash. We are very much hooked into the Blackbaud website with our Google SSO, SmartTuition, and Schooldoc integrations. It would be difficult for us to transition. That is the main reason I haven't really entertained other web firms.
Integrating Blackbaud Education Management Solutions
- SmartTuition
We did the integration back in 2017 and I remember it was a big process.
- none
Smart is the only vendor we need to work with for EM
- Single Signon
- API (e.g. SOAP or REST)
Use another platform. EM is terrible.
Using Blackbaud Education Management Solutions
4 - Admissions, Business Office, Communications
2 - Admissions, Communications/Web Manager
- We print contracts
- We use for admissions purposes to book tours and testing
- Be able to load all your admission applicants
- run accurate reports for admissions
- Track your admissions numbers
- run contracts for new and current families
- Maybe to re-imagine the admissions process and change things there
Evaluating Blackbaud Education Management Solutions and Competitors
Yes - A long time ago we had Education Edge but transition to EM
- Product Features
We transitioned because we wanted to integrate the data with the website.
I probably would have been more involved in the transition and maybe looked at some other admissions modules/tools out there. There are so many other robust admissions platforms. I know EM is lacking in many areas.
Blackbaud Education Management Solutions Support
I didn't know there was such a thing.
There have been times when my issue gets resolved quickly. I can't pinpoint one time where someone went above and beyond recently, however.
Using Blackbaud Education Management Solutions
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Feel confident using | Unnecessarily complex Difficult to use Inconsistent Slow to learn Cumbersome |
- Once you get the hang of creating contracts they are easy, but getting their is a pain!
- creating an admissions application is fairly simple
- processing contracts are totally convoluted. the entire process is wonky and not user friendly
- processing an application does take training. It's not something you just figure out.