With the first month of school in the books, students are settled in and have a good idea of what their teachers expect of them. For some teachers, among all their expectations is to make an account for the grading site of their teacher’s choice. However, not every teacher uses the same grading site, making technology a hassle for many students.
Although Sophomore Joshua Kim only uses Google Classroom and Turnitin, he still wishes that “teachers would stick to one site.” This is because during the first few physics labs he got used to handing them in to Google Classroom and he found that the switch to Turnitin was inconvenient and “pointless.” However, being that he only has to use 2 sites, he doesn’t have an issue with remembering passwords.
Junior Ashish Bansal also doesn’t have an issue with passwords, as he uses 3 sites but has the same password on each site. Like Joshua, Ashish would like to see teachers change to a single site for the whole school saying, “It would allow me to see every grade in one grading site and would not have multiple accounts on multiple websites.”
Despite being new to the school, freshman Emily Yan, who uses 3 sites, has already formed her opinions on the topic. She agrees with Joshua and Ashish, saying, “Going on one site is definitely easier than several… so that I don’t have to go on and memorize multiple websites at a time just to check my grades.” However, Emily sees why the teachers would do this, spectating that “each teacher is used to their own website with grades … that fit the teacher’s grading system… and don’t really want to use their time learning how to use a new site.”
History teacher Alex Wood has his students use Jupiter Grades for various reasons. A big part of why he chooses Jupiter is because of its efficiency. From a teacher’s perspective, he can create an assignment and copy it to all his classes. Additionally, if all his students get the same grade, he can fill in all of the grades simultaneously. From a parent’s perspective, Wood can send students’ grades to them by email in case if the parent doesn’t go on Jupiter often. He receives positive feedback about Jupiter during Parent-Teacher Conferences quite frequently. Regarding Eschool Data, Wood says the teachers didn’t have much of a say in picking it, but he feels like a switch to Jupiter would be “worth the disruption.”
Mr. Fong, a student teacher for Dr. Steinmann, says he thinks Edmodo, a site that Dr. Steinmann uses with her government and law students, “is great because it allows students to stay connected to their school and keep track of their work when they are off campus.” Edmodo has a facebook-esque layout, where Steinmann frequently takes advantage of to show videos, political service opportunities, and post homework assignments. Students can comment where they have any questions.
