Gradelink Reviews

Gradelink is a very simple School information System (SIS). As such, the setup time is very fast. The Gradelink support team is very helpful in getting the support that is necessary.

Because the SIS is a simple, there are not many additional features. The basic features- gradebook, lesson plans, etc. are accessible. However, the more complex features are not available.

The integration into our existing system was painful, mainly because our previous processes were primitive and we had some unique requirements being a religious school that is partly a boarding school and partly a local school and serves both high school and college. Gradelink was not setup for that scenario but worked very hard with us to create work-arounds that, after one year, seem to be working well. Their communication included all the methods we needed and replaced a hodge-podge of approaches we had been using. It is now seamless and very useful. Our parents are very appreciative of the improved communication we now offer as well as the mobile app that lets them more easily track their child's progress. Teachers love the ease with which assignments can be created and scored. The addition of Google Classroom integration was huge for our school as we a fully committed to Classroom and can now easily sync grades. Their approach works well with few hiccups once you have the process down.

We were told that we would be able to handle both our high school and our college with one "copy" of Gradelink. This has proved problematic, but GL continues to work with us on solving those problems. There are still problems we are having with transcripts and class rank and hope those get solved before the end of the year.

The software is intuitive and easy to understand. The times when we needed additional help, customer service was always available and resolved our issues quickly.

Some of the training videos could be updated.

I was able to figure out how to use most of the features by watching the training videos. I utilize the solutions homepage often.

The ability to pull information out of the database is not as strong as I would like for reporting functions.

All in one system for teachers, students, parents, and administration.

When we first started using Gradelink it was very hard to communicate given the 3 hour time change, but this has been improved immensely

It is very user friendly and covers everything we need. I like that you can easily correct issues in the finance area. Email and text messages are easy to set up and send out. I still have things to learn about some of the finer points - reports etc.

Some reports under financials can get quit lenthly. Wish it was on fewer pages etc. especially when running statement by category.

I chose Gradelink for our school because the basic system had so many components. Other SIS's I researched charged per component. Smartsend Pro makes communication easy. We added the online payment integration for incidentals. Gradelink allows for the flexibility to fit the needs of my school.

Adding on or starting up a new feature and/or personaliztion of the product can sometimes be time consuming.

The software is fully featured, and offers a lot of bells-and-whistles within the basic package (attendance, grades, email messaging, discipline, GPA, reports, report-cards generation, contact info, emergency info, medical records info etc.). For a moderate price, you can add a few more features (e.g. unlimited text messaging, parent/student registration etc). The platform is very intuitive and allows a lot of customization (grade periods, grade scale, weighted grading, own discipline and attendance system etc). Support is well rounded, with a lot of online instructional materials (video and text) and phone support is very responsive. Another nice thing is that you can open simultaneously several accounts (admin, teacher, etc) in the same browser, and it has good security measures (accounts can be blocked by admin, you know who signed last and when, accounts get locked after third wrong singnin attempt etc).

The overall aspect is outdated, the colors are bleak, the whole system looks old school. Also, it behaves weirdly when averaging periods and grades (sometimes), you don't know exactly how it's done.

The ease of use for this software is definitely the best available. I have never used a system that works as seamlessly as this one does. I cannot imagine using anything else.

It was a little difficult to navigate inputting the lesson plans

EVERYTHING!!! I'm able to retrieve reports at the push of a button.

So far on the discipline side, I want to be able to determine when my incident types are occurring throughout the day so that I can utilize my intervention team and plan.

I like that there are a lot of functions, and it can be used for many things... for teachers, administration, lunch staff... everyone is working form the same place. We only have to have one program and it works.

There are a lot of functions, and a lot of things can be done with one program. :) This program takes some time to get used to. You have to watch ALL the training videos (the videos are good). But there are little things like having to type in the same contact person over and over for different children. There should be an option to add a new person or add an existing person to a pickup list. Also, I don't understand why the online payments don't get posted to the Ledger. If they pay with a credit card online I still have to manually add it to the Ledger so they can see that they paid for tuition. In the program we used last year it showed up automatically. One more thing, when a child is checked in/out or signed in/out for attendance, is there a way for the name of that child to be a different color or something when they are in or out. Sometimes teachers can't remember if a student was checked in or not, so they do it again, but this signs the student out. Then they have to do it again to sign them in again. If there was a way for the students' names to look different (like a different color) when they are signed in then it would be very helpful. Thank you.

This software allows our admin and teachers to work smarter not harder. The the software is utilized the easier it becomes to start a new school year because so much info carries over. The information that parents and students have is presented differently because each user has a different goal for using the software. Gradelink makes it easy to integrate all aspects of the education environment into one easy to use vehicle.

The software does not allow users to edit and input their own personal information. There fore keeping up on ever-changing hone numbers and even teacher info is a challenge. The information from previous years is not as easy to access. It is accessible though.

I needed a program that would be easy to implement, easy to use, and affordable. After reviewing a number of SIS programs, Gradelink met the needs of the school. Having the program for five years I have found new staff members are able to jump in quickly, parents love the ease of communication and availability of attendance, grades, and comments concerning their children. We also use the "news" page to keep parents up to date with reminders and current events. I use the program for snow cancellation and delays, as well as blast informational emails to our community, including alumni.

There are still a couple of pieces of information that take me time to access, including a quick attendance report on an individual student or a readable transcript that is inclusive of attendance, but a part of that might be my lack of knowledge. Customer service has been excellent in helping us customize report cards, something we could not do independently. Some of the staff is still reluctant to use the planning program to its full capacity, I'm not sure if there is an overarching reason or merely a comfortability learning curve.

I love the ease of use, functionality, and cost of this software. However the part I like MOST is the customer service. Whenever we have a question or issue, Gradelink customer service/technical support representatives are helpful and friendly.

The only part of Gradelink that I don't love is the lesson planning feature. It is sufficient, and I could easily get by using that module. However, I prefer the flexibility of another lesson planning product.

Gradelink has been user friendly and provides us with all that we need to store our student information and communicate with our families at a reasonable price. The customer service has been great. It is easy for us to call and get help if we get confused or don't understand an aspect of the program. We do not need to set aside days to do teacher training. The program is simple enough that brief training sessions and video links are all we need to train new teachers. Ease of enrollment and re-enrollment are nice as well.

At times, I would like more features, such as digital sign in for our preschool and aftercare. They have a program for that, but it is not what we need, so we will wait patiently for the program to be perfected! :)

When parents enroll, we have found that they can skip certain answers by just putting in a space or a letter, for example. We would like for that feature to some how be fixed.

Some of the best endorsements of Gradelink are from our teachers and parents. Teachers who aren't particularly comfortable with technology say this is the most user-friendly SIS they have ever encountered. Those who are comfortable with technology find the system easy to learn and use effectively.

I like that Gradelink just seems so intuitive. It behaves like it was designed from the school's needs up, as opposed to systems that seem to be designed from the top down by programmers to do what they think schools need.

I was the system administrator for several years and worked with Gradelink customer support extensively. They were excellent! We had to implement new report cards, and they worked closely with us through the transition. I also liked the ability to create a test student to see how something would work before running with it. For functions that are only performed once in a while, e.g. opening a new term, Gradelink has links on that page with quick how-to reminders. You don't have to open and wade through a separate help window. I found that a great time saver.

Parents find the system easy to use and so do our middle school students, who check their grades and monitor assignments routinely. We also like the communications portions of the program. The teacher pages, email capability, grade-books, etc. are all available with a single sign-in.

We've all gotten used to Microsoft and Google email products, and email from the Gradelink platform doesn't have all the features users find in dedicated email systems.

For grades, it is live right away--there isn't a way to post grades, but not publish them until a later time. That might be desirable in some isolated cases, so much of a drawback all things considered.

Every information we need is stored in G.Link. All lesson plans and standards are together. Standards carry a lot of information for teachers. Grades are easily entered and are not lost. Parents communication has gotten better this year because of G.Link. Every teacher has a web page that she/he can design.
Administrators can publish their announcement daily, weekly and monthly.

We like the fact that it prepares the students' report cards and transcripts. We do not have to do that any more. The discipline, students' health life, parents' information is all there for us.
Teachers like it so much. They still need to get used to it and the deadlines they receive but I know for a fact that they like the features in the lesson plans such as copy and paste the whole week then make daily changes. I keep teaching this feature because that 's what will make their planning so easy, especially for those ho have 6 different subjects to plan.

I love how the administrator can easily check teachers' lesson plans, up to date grades. Teachers reports is another feature that is really valuable. Once teacher understand how to use, they can retrieve a lot of information from those reports and use.

The Gradelink staff and team members are extremely sharp and helpful. They usually give us answers right a way even if we call 10 times a day. They still help.
They know well that once we get it we will stop calling them. I love their big support.

One thing does bother me. We want to send information to parents such as pictures, newsletters and so on. We can not send 2 at the time or more than one.
We have to wait a certain time in order to send another info. This does work for us as we have to send timely information. Something that we have to send today, we can wait until next week to send. It is time sensitive.

I do enjoy this software immensely! It has a lot of great features, which meld together seamlessly. I have used this software both as a guidance counselor with full admin privileges, and as a teacher. It is easily accessible to parents, and allows teachers to keep parents informed on a daily basis. The platform appears to be solid, and I don't have random "grade changes" while I'm not looking! I've listed four small issues below. When these are fixed, it will be fairly close to perfect, and I will be able to give it five stars all around. As with any multiple-feature computer program, there is a learning curve.
Customer support is always there and willing to talk to us.

1. We cannot set up grading differently for middle school and high school. (We would like 25% per quarter, 10% exam for middle school, 40/40/20 for high school.) 2. We cannot easily select out parent vs. student e-mail in the Communicate section. 3. I would like to ability to write a comment on a transcript that is neither a test nor an award. 4. I would like to have the ability to print out a grade level of transcript. Specifying graduation year rather than grade level would be fine.

Once you learn it; it is easy to remember how to apply skills and teach others.

There are times when I would like to export information to create mailing labels or rosters for testing and to my knowledge, I am not able to do this with Gradelink.

I love the customer support and how easy it is for me to get an answer for what I’m looking for. Never have I worked with better customer support!

I’m not a fan of the lesson plans. They are designed to mirror Planbook, but the features just aren’t there to facilitate it. We ended up switching back to planbook this year. It’s slightly aggravating because gradelink is an all in one system.

This software helps us organize our student and parent population. We keep track of attendance and grading which allows us to print out report cards and keep grading information on gradelink.com. We can keep track of student alumni so we can keep in touch. We also are able to use the system to keep in touch with potential families who are looking for quality education. Customer service is fabulous! Every time I call with a question they help me in a friendly manner and solve my problem. We use the system keep track of hours at the Preschool and aftercare and thus are able to quickly see who may owe for such services.

They are still developing some aspects so sometimes a feature is not yet available. Such as last year we were looking at the sign in/out feature but it was not ready. This year we are using it!

Gradelink offers schools a complete school and student management system that can be easily custom designed.

The only concern is that we are on the East Coast and customer service is on the West Coast.

Gradelink is user-friendly! I can sit with a new teacher for less than an hour and have him or her fully functioning. Also, the support library of articles is extensive and covers many issues that may come up. I have gone there countless times and find exactly what I need.

I have not experienced any serious problems with this software. It does exactly what you tell it to do!
The only category that I would like to see open up for customization by the user a little more would be the transcripts. There are categories that can be completed for awards and the degree obtained; however, there are other notable items to list on the transcript such as community service hour requirements and things that don't fit in the pre-made categories list. It would be nice to have a place to make additional notations on the transcripts.

Love that we can mass email, individuals or whole grades. Gradelink is user friendly, everything is in one place. There are a lot of tools that parents can use to access grades, assignments, teacher's pages, and now we've set it up for discipline. (instead of using a separate program) Parents also have input on community service hours, we can add ACT/SAT scores to transcripts, too.

That the "Not Re-enrolled" button doesn't work. It just gives all students, instead of the ones not re-enrolled.
Teachers not having the ability to send a text for their classes. - So, they have to use "Remind"

We really trust Gradelink, as they previously hosted our old site and always do a great job with our school package we have through them. Since we knew we were overdue for an updated website, it was an automatic choice for us to ask Gradelink to handle the design. We are so thrilled with our new website! It is so much cleaner, fresher, user-friendly, precise and engaging. Vince helped us take the next best steps and continues to assure us beyond the finished product, which demonstrates outstanding customer service. Rep was absolutely phenomenal! So very patient, detail-oriented, honest, attentive and kind he went above and beyond to make sure we were satisfied with the final product and that we felt comfortable to collaborate and share our ideas and needs during the building process. Our site needed so much work, and he was always very gracious in our planning meetings. His expertise was so evident and he worked extremely hard to ensure our satisfaction. Genuine excitement about our website project was also evident and helped spur us along when we needed to envision our future site. We are so grateful for Rep and Gradelink!

Everyone on our team isn't super "techy" so there will be a learning curve. However, we are glad that we can utilize the monthly support that Gradelink offers.