Olivia West, Editor
@oliviawcourant
Last year, when a typical student wanted to do their homework, they might have to go through Google Classroom to get their English assignments, use Turn It In to submit essays, access their Social Studies homework through Moodle, and find their foreign language resources on Quia. Because every different class was on a different website, even just locating homework every night was a struggle for students.
This year, however, teachers are required to switch to Schoology, with the aim to put all classroom resources onto one platform. As teachers and students alike discover the advantages and disadvantages of this new website, the learning environment at our school is evolving.
Emily Hernberg, the new technology integrator, helps teachers enhance their existing curriculums with different websites and technologies, and is a key part of the Schoology integration. “Teachers are facing the challenge of getting to know a really, really complicated new platform,” Ms. Hernberg said. “Students will notice that teachers are kind of all over the map, ranging from teachers that are more experienced because they were a part of the pilot program to teachers who were just introduced to the website and may only have their syllabus on Schoology.”
Jennifer Lee, a math teacher who was a part of the Schoology pilot program last year, said that Schoology helps to keep her classroom activities consolidated. “I used to put everything in packets, and, by the end of the year, students had huge stacks of paper if they hadn’t cleared out their folders. Now, I put a lot of those same worksheets onto Schoology, which helps to keep everything in one place and online,” Ms. Lee said.
As a part of the Schoology pilot program, Ms. Lee has more training on the platform than most. “Most of the teachers who were involved in the pilot last year are part of a school-wide Schoology committee. We meet once a month to share feedback from our departments, about what’s going well, what’s challenging, and what the next steps are,” Ms. Lee said.
Senior James Gibb said that there’s definitely a learning curve when it comes to teachers using Schoology. “For some teachers, it might not be as straightforward or as user-friendly as Google Classroom,” James said. “For example, in one of my classes, there was a problem with getting the review presentation on Schoology. We ended up only being able to see it the day before the three-chapter test.”
Junior Alex Kurz has similar concerns regarding Schoology, including the fact that not all of her teachers use the platform for their resources. “I think the whole purpose was to make things easier for everyone by bringing all of the classes together into one spot. If not all classes are located on the website, however, then we are still flipping from website to website and class to class,” Alex said.
Despite the initial challenges for both teachers and students, many of the teachers and administrators are very excited for the future of Schoology. “At its full potential, Schoology will be able to do things such as display grades, connect with Google Drive, proctor tests, and even contain a portfolio that will follow the student from year to year,” Ms. Hernberg said. “It’s a long-term investment that, I hope, will really pay off.”
