Missouri district switches to Clever for sign-on simplification

Switching from an alternative solution to Clever provides Neosho’s IT team with a valuable troubleshooting feature, customizable data options, and simplified student logins that prioritize teachers’ time.

Clever snapshot

Clever is a single-sign-on (SSO) learning portal utilized by more than half of the K-12 students in the US. Clever gathers all of your most used instructional technology pieces into a digital classroom for students, teachers, and staff to access in a single step. Want to join the nearly 100,000 schools that are making edtech easier? Get started for free today by visiting us here. If you’re already using Clever, use your Portal Implementation Checklist to review setup and roll out Clever to your district.

The challenge: Login issues with alternative SSO solution 

The manual processes and CSV exports necessary to integrate vendors with the SIS were taxing and time-consuming. Neosho School District (NSD) Administrators invested in a paid SSO platform in an attempt to streamline vendor rostering and sign-on. Unfortunately, the underlying infrastructure of this alternative SSO solution wasn’t syncing data correctly. These errors led to district-wide login issues. Teachers and students were often left without access to instructional favorites like Nearpod.

Mandy Lybeck, Director of Educational Technology at NSD, was frustrated as the almost 6,000 students and staff in her district struggled with inefficient sign-on processes due to these syncing issues. The district was losing money on the edtech apps it had invested in, as well as the costly SSO platform that was delivering more problems than solutions.  After almost a year of trying to make it work, NSD’s IT team threw in the towel and sought a more efficient solution.

The solution: Switching to Clever

Lybeck and the IT Team had already been slowly rostering instructional applications in Clever, and over time had built a sizable library of apps, programs, and resources. Most of their vendors were already integrated with Clever. They soon realized that teachers were already using Clever in their classrooms for easy student logins, even without the district officially rolling out Clever. The IT Team discovered that the reliable, effective edtech partner they were searching for was under their nose the entire time.

The best part? Teachers chose a solution that was also approved by the district. K-2 teachers love the simple “Badge scan” login method for younger users. Badges save cumulative hours of instructional time previously wasted walking students through URLs, usernames, and passwords.

If NSD has any challenges with logins, the admin takes advantage of Clever’s innovative “Access Portal As” feature multiple times per week for easy troubleshooting. Lybeck and her team love this option, as it gives them a front-row seat to the teacher and student experience within Clever in real-time—even if the user is off-site.

Brian Cook, Student Information System Administrator at NSD, celebrates some of the customization options Clever offers. He’s able to create custom sections, and give more access to student teachers and co-teachers who otherwise would be restricted. All of this data can be maneuvered without making changes to NSD’s SIS.

Key benefits of Clever as SSO solution

• Expedites troubleshooting: Solving problems for students and teachers became much easier when NSD’s IT Admin could utilize the “Access Portal As User” feature to get a bird’s eye view of the account in question.
• Flexible data customization: Clever gives IT the ability to customize their data in a way that rosters students and teachers without compromising their SIS for the purpose of state reporting.
• Teachers’ choice: NSD’s teachers adopted Clever without an official roll-out. Many were able to implement and operate without explicit professional development. This natural momentum is a testimony to Clever’s ease of use.
• Recaptured instructional time: Simple, accurate sign-on procedures save valuable time for teachers and students.

Want to join the nearly 100,000 schools that are making edtech easier? Get started for free today by visiting us here. If you’re already using Clever, use your Portal Implementation Checklist to review setup and roll out Clever to your district.