Edsby Reviews

It has everything in one: class lists, marking, calculating, parent communication, groups for student communication, at a glance information.

I kept may marks on Edsby and had a student move away out of province. His profile immediately disappeared. When there were questions and issues about his marks from the new school, I was unable to provide history. When I wrote for support, I received no response.

The ability to make online quizzes/tests that auto-grade and enter into the gradebook

Where to begin...
I'm amazed that any LMS software does not have an import/export feature for it's test bank.
I've had numerous times that multiple choice test questions had blank answers when the students took the test - although this should be 'impossible' since when MANUALLY typing in each question and answr choices, it will not let you save a blank answer.
When cross-posting assignments, some propagate when edited and some do not. But nothing on the entry screen tells which ones.
There is no way to enter in a test/quiz grade manually for students that require alternative testing methods - unless you change the online submission type to 'none' - which then deletes the info for all of the students that took the online test.
and there are NO UNDO options.
On many screens where an information bubble pops up - it remains there no matter what is clicked on and you have to reload the page to make it go away.
For assignments with a letter grade - there is no option to give a ZERO - and a U does not calculate in as a zero.
New pinned items go at the bottom when they should show at the top - or at least give an option without having to manually drag it.
Anytime I have opened a ticket with support - I either get no answer, an answer that is later contradicted when I ask for more detail, or a "working as designed" with absolutely no offer to consider that ALL of our teachers would logistically prefer a feature to function differently

I like the fact that I can communicate with students and parents in terms of due dates, test dates, missed work (I post what I do in class everyday and attach any assignments), as well as progress in the course (missing assignments, marked assignments, etc.).

I don't like how I can't enter multiple mark sets at time. I also wish there were attendance sheets with dates at the top (not the blank mark sheets). I also wish we could make our own names for what goes in the mark bucket (the drop-down list is good, but I wish I could choose the names of some of my items - example: "Fitness" for phys ed class). I wish there was a save function for report carding because I've had it happen where I've lost my internet connection and therefore, lost my recent comments for students.

As the School IT Admin, Edsby takes care of many details that I do not have to. This frees me to deal with local on-site concerns.
As a teacher, I absolutely love the Gradebook, the Classroom Journal, and the Library. These features allow me to have all of my materials in one place. I can go online just about anywhere and access my work. The journal also allows students to stay up-to-date if they are away, and they can have access to any work that was covered that day.

As a teacher, I really appreciate integration of student work and the Gradebook. Unfortunately, I have had too many experiences when students are unable to submit their work from their Google Drive.

I like that 'everything" is in one place.
I like that communication with parents (theoretically) is streamlined.

I hate the gradebook. It is inflexible and does not give me the information I want.
I don't like that every change is communicated so precisely to parents (for example if I change a grade, it adds a comment - isn't changing the grade enough? I can add a comment if I want to.)
I don't like that each item gives parents the percent it is worth out of the total. It takes away from my professional judgement and allows parents and students to calculate their overall percent which is something our board has opted NOT to tell parent.s

What I like most about Edsby is the ease of use for teachers and students. This year, I've been working to save time and money with limiting photocopies. By posting work on Edsby, the students can view the assignment without printing. The students can complete the assignments and submit it online without any additional system. This software works great and it is a great communication tool.

It is difficult to modify grades on a mobile device. In addition, I've request a gradebook filter so that teachers do not have to view the entire gradebook. It would be nice to have a filter for each grading period.

The best part about Edsby is all the amazing features it includes. You can store students grade and share them with students and parents, it's a means of collaboration space for the teacher, student, and parent to stay connected and up to date on student learning and progress. It also allows teachers to create test that can be assigned to students and the grade automatically populates in the grade book.

I have no complaints about this software it is awesome!!

The all-in-one functionality of Edsby is most helpful. Grade book, attendance, announcements, calendar, parent and student records/communication, seating plans, library of course material and bulletins for overarching course goals.

The Library does not serve me. I have to reupload my course material every time I teach the course, even if I'm teaching the same course twice in the same semester. I have to delete auto-posted files from the feed that end up in the library otherwise it will become quickly over-run, confusing and ineffective as a communicative tool.

The program is visual and easy to use.
There is an APP so students have easy access to information AND less paper is required eg. homework handouts, timetables. etc.
The parents can easily access their child's school information (attendance, marks, etc.)

One can't do a search within the posts in a group
Information doesn't always sync correctly from our main database.

Been using Esdby for years, on a daily base with classes, to share or collection information from my students/parents/staff. From the voting buttons, to notifying us when messages have been read and the classroom rosters sheets; Edsby is an Awesome classroom management tool - easy to use too! *****

I'm still waiting for them to put a time stamp feature - which would allow me to select when I want posts to appear to my students.

I like that parents have the ability to be as involved as they want in what is happening at their child's school. It is easy to use, from an administrative perspective, and also from a parent perspective. Students have the ability to stay up to date on all their work, even if they are away. They are able to communicate with their teachers and the administrators of their school.

I had a few issues with the classes not having room numbers last year, but that was quickly resolved! As of this moment, there isn't anything I would change.

I enjoy the way a class is organized in different subjects and how teachers can be co-administrators.

There is no way to set up a post to be published in the future or to pin it to the top of the conversation.

Communication with parents, students, and staff is easy. I use the calendar daily in order to make note of due dates and provide message reminders regularly. Having an outlet to post important documents is also highly valued.

Seeing student marks is challenging; the print versions are poor as printing marks are not visible and print templates lack space to write information. Viewing data could also be more user friendly. It would be nice for learning skills from Report 1 to remain in place for Report 2 as well.

It's easy to collaborate. I like that we have staff groups and can easily update each other. I also like the observation feature to keep up to date with behaviour concerns and issues.

No notifications is tough because I often miss messages or notifications for things when I am busy.

Accessing attendance electronically via Edsby, marking multiple students and creating planned absences has allowed me to be more efficient in my day to day.

The ability to reach our whole parent/guardian community. In the past we've had a blog that we've posted news and events to. Edsby does not allow us to format an email - bold/italics, insert graphics, tables, bullets, etc. If a parent/guardian has not subscribed to Edsby, we have no way of getting information to them. Ideally, we'd like to be a paperless school, but without having the option to reach our whole community, we're unable to do so.

The ease of use and ability to create numerous pages and groups. In addition, the report card and assessment tracking system is all we could ask for. Finally, the privacy settings and ability to invite and block certain groups is seamless which is very important for a school

As many areas in education constantly evolve, so does the need for shifting the way we do things online. Edsby doesn't always have stock items already built into the software; so, occasionally we need to ask them to create it for us. However, they are always responsive and get this done in a timely manner

Easy to use and helps meet the needs of classroom teachers.

Messaging system should be more like email. Deleting and forwarding messages. Report card functions not reliable. Must have folders to store and retrieve comments.

The ease of use. The ability for us to accomplish many things in one platform. We can keep our calendar, grades and report cards all in one place.

We need to add a few more features for it to meet our SIS needs. Although it's not an SIS, it is very close. If we could input items related to health cards, health information and a few more customizable inputs, it would help us even more.

Edsby is a great place to keep everything organized for your class. You can do a lot with it, and really helps with students who accidentally keep losing all the handouts you give them.

There are a few little bugs that can be annoying. It needs to work far better as a mobile app. On a computer it's great.

Communication. With parents, students, collegues and clubs. Having a central hub for communication has been amazing.

I would like the gradebook to be more transparent and have a bit more functionallity wrt weighting. Also, it can be a little frustrating uploading images, and the library doesn't give enough information about the files I've stored in it.

Access from anywhere but the teacher app needs more functionality.

The LMS feature could be more intuitive and the teacher app needs improvements for marking.