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Google Apps for Education

Eight 'Google Apps for Education' stories June 2011 - December 2015
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Chromebooks win education as Google takes over from Apple & Microsoft in classrooms

Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Dec 4 2015 - 6:12 am PT
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Chromebooks have emerged as the clear leader in the classroom, reports CNBC, leaving former market leader Apple for dust.

Chromebooks now make up more than half of all devices in U.S. classrooms, up from less than 1 percent in 2012, according to a new report from Futuresource Consulting […]

Google’s rapid gains come at the expense of its biggest rivals. Over the past three years, Apple’s market share been slashed by more than half, from 52 to 24 percent and Microsoft’s market share has slipped from 43 to 24 percent.

Chromebooks now make up 4.4M of the 8.9M devices sold to schools and school districts, with Google noting that it is seeing the dual benefit of both increased market share and overall growth in demand for computing devices in schools … 
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Privacy group files FTC complaint that Google “deceptively tracks students’ Internet browsing”

Avatar for Ben Lovejoy Dec 2 2015 - 4:48 am PT
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Privacy campaigners the Electronic Frontier Foundation have filed a formal complaint with the FTC, claiming that Google “deceptively tracks students’ Internet browsing.” They say that Google is in breach of the Student Privacy Pledge the search giant signed back in January. Once Google signed, the terms became legally binding on the company.

The EFF says that one issue is with Chrome Sync, a feature designed to enable users to work with the same bookmarks, logins and other data across devices. Chrome Sync is currently switched on by default on Chromebooks sold to schools, and the EFF says that Google collects this data and uses it for other purposes … 
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Google Docs gains speech to text, new templates, smart sheets, more

Avatar for Tom Maxwell Sep 2 2015 - 12:01 pm PT
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Update: Two other minor updates targeted to business customers have also been included. Text inside a Sheets cell can now be partially formatted, rather than formatting all the text to one font style (i.e. italics), and Google’s fonts are preserved when opening a Docs or Sheets file in Microsoft Word and PowerPoint.

Google has today pushed a bunch of new features and general improvements to its Docs suite of web-based productivity apps. It’s the beginning of the school year so it’s no surprise that the company’s post on the changes is targeted towards teachers, but anyone using Docs will benefit.


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Google’s new courses help teachers seeking to integrate its services into the classroom

Avatar for Tom Maxwell Jun 26 2015 - 9:44 am PT
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Google wants schools to take advantage of its Apps for Education suite of productivity tools and services, but it also recognizes that proper professional development is essential to enabling educators and transforming education. The company today announced the release of a free training platform that provides interactive lessons with a focus on how to successfully complete real classroom tasks and objectives using Google products.

The new platform is called Google for Education Training Center and builds upon a recent survey by the American Federation of Teachers which found that 71% of educators and administrators surveyed cited “adoption of new initiatives without proper training or professional development” as a primary source of stress in their work lives. The new tools are supposed to help teachers apply Google’s tools in the classroom and beyond.

The lessons, like how to get students collaborating using Drive and Docs, are organized around the three themes above and range in difficulty from beginner courses to those targeted at teachers who already know their way around Google’s products quite well but might inspiration on how to differently using the products with their students.

As part of the announcement, Google says that it has brought on the Chicago Public Schools, a school district including over 600 schools and 400,000 students, as a launch partner for the Training Center. The district will use Training Center as a part of its technology professional development program, and the course will count towards its teachers’ professional development hours.

“The Training Center reflects what we value most about education, focusing on the process of learning rather than the tools themselves,” the company says. More information about the Training Center and to try the lessons, Apps for Education customers can visit g.co/edutrainingcenter.

New York City Department of Education says yes to Chromebooks and Google apps

Avatar for Mark Hearn Nov 17 2014 - 9:13 am PT
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The New York City Department of Education Division of Instructional and Informational Technology has approved Google Apps for Education as a supported platform for its schools. After evaluating the search giant’s offerings, NYC Department of Education CIO, Hal Friedlander and his team decided to add Google’s productivity suite and affordable notebooks to their list of approved tools for New York’s schools.


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Google announces over 20M Apps for Education users

Avatar for Jordan Kahn Oct 2 2012 - 8:14 am PT
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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=2Y0Gm02XGis#!]

As noted on the Official Google Blog, Google has now reached 20 million students using its Google Apps for Education products; and in celebration of World Teachers’ Day on Friday, the company posted some stats to highlight the product’s success. It is also highlighting amazing teachers on its Google in Education Google+ page. The first video (above) features Ms. Kornowski. She is “a science teacher at Kettle-Moraine High School in Wales, WI, who is using Google Forms to bring her students together.”

Some of the highlights of Google Apps for Education over the last year:

  • 400+ universities are posting lectures and/or full courses online using YouTube Edu
  • 600,000 staff from the Philippines Department of Education will now be using Google Apps
  • Universities across the continents are signing up for Apps, including schools inPoland, Spain, the Netherlands and Africa
  • More than 500 schools and districts went back to school with Chromebooks this fall
  • Seven of the eight Ivy League universities and 72 of this year’s top 100 U.S. universities (as determined by 2013 U.S. News and World Report’s ranking)have gone Google with Google Apps for Education

Many schools abandon Microsoft Office for Google Apps to save money; Google Docs added 100 new features in 2011

Avatar for Élyse Betters Jan 3 2012 - 8:21 pm PT
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Google Apps is a Google service that features several Web applications similar to traditional office suites. The services vary per edition but generally include Docs, Gmail, Calendar, Talk, Sites, Groups, Video, and Marketplace. Its popularity among students and educational institutions is rapidly increasing due to enhanced sharing features, accessibility and cost.

Google Apps for Education is just one edition that offers 25 GB of storage space per user for free through K-12 schools, colleges, and universities with up to 30,000 users. Forty-million active users currently use Google Apps, and according to US News & World Report, 61 of the Top 100 schools have switched to the educational service.

“Google Apps offers simple, powerful communication and collaboration tools for educational institutions of any size – all hosted by Google to minimize maintenance and reduce IT costs,” said Google Apps for Education on its website. “Google Apps is provided to educational institutions at no charge, and is hosted on the same enterprise-class infrastructure used by corporate and government customers.”

UC Berkeley announced Dec. 21 that they planned to make Google Apps for Education their new campus calendar and email system. “Operation Excellence” is a cost cutting initiative designed by the university to save $75 million annually. UC Berkeley currently offers their campus faculty, students and staff access to Microsoft software and Adobe Creative Suite free of charge. However, campus officials agreed to convert to Google Apps for Education in January 2012.


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Survey: Students love their Gmail and Chat, Sites not so much

Avatar for 9to5 Staff Jun 9 2011 - 2:09 pm PT
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Gmail was the most widely used Google Apps service for Brown University (above), but Chat tops the customer satisfaction charts (below)

Brown University conducted a telling survey in May, asking some 1,100 students and faculty/staff members to evaluate Brown’s migration to Google Apps for Education eighteen months ago. Like everywhere, Gmail was the service of choice for a whopping 98 percent of the respondents, but satisfaction index for Chat – used by two-thirds of the respondents – topped the charts: 99 percent for Chat versus Gmail’s 90 percent. Nearly five out of five undergraduate, graduate and professional student respondents were “Very Satisfied” or “Satisfied” with Google’s web-based email.

Google Sites was less popular, having been used by one in three respondents. Docs and Calendar were used by the respectable 85 percent and 79 percent of the respondents, respectively. Most frequently used apps on a daily basis? Gmail (97 percent), Calendar (60 percent), Chat (33 percent), Documents (29 percent) and Sites (eight percent). And when issues rose, nearly half the respondents sought answers on Google’s official help pages and Google search.

More food for thought and four additional pretty charts bellow.


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