Sifting through different Chromebook management software options can feel like a slog. 

How do you know what is right for your school or your district?

Chromebook management software is designed to make virtual learning more efficient and safer for students. Once you know your goals for a management program and your budget, choosing one becomes simpler.

Here we will talk about some popular Chromebook management software programs and how they can help schools and the students they serve.

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Effortlessly Enroll Into Organizations Units With Go-Box

Using Go-Box to enroll your Chromebooks allows you to:

  • Enroll large Chromebook fleets quickly and efficiently
  • Remove human error in manual enrollment processes
  • Enroll 16 Chromebooks every two minutes

And all without the need for extensive coding knowledge.

Many school districts use unique organizational units (OUs) which have different applications and restrictions. 

With Go-Box you can configure an unrestricted number of templates to accommodate all the OUs you need. 

When Chromebooks are enrolled, Go-Box interacts with the OUs. Go-Box enrolls Chromebooks into the desired OUs by using specific enrollment credentials that are associated with each OU. The credentials must be pre-configured in the Google Admin Console and associated with the desired OU.

Go-Box enrolls the Chromebooks quickly and efficiently, and the management software keeps you connected to each unit. 

Keep reading to learn about some popular Chromebook classroom management software programs and how they can be useful for your teachers, administrators, students, and their families.

Why Do Schools Manage Chromebooks?

Providing students with personalized Chromebooks helps bring our schools closer to equity. A school-issued Chromebook may be the only device for that family. And each of those Chromebooks needs to be enrolled into the school system

That’s a lot of time and energy.

In Q4 2020, there was a 4x growth in Chromebook sales. During the pandemic, the need to have digital access for students to their classrooms was higher than ever which helped send sales soaring. 

Because of the growing popularity of Chromebooks, protecting students is critical. When there is effective Chromebook management, educators can also better regulate student behavior online.

How Do I Manage My School on Chromebook?

Before deciding on a paid classroom monitoring software, setting up your Google Admin Console account is a great first step. 

Through the Google Admin console, administrators are given an admin account that can be used to manage all of the Google services in your school district or organization.

Customizing Chromebooks via the Google Admin Console allows educators to provide different levels of freedom and can even create customized roles. 

For example, using the Admin Console, administrators can create different organizational units such as:

  • Admin
  • Faculty
  • K-8 students
  • Grade 9-12 students
  • Etc. 

Through this admin account, you’ll have the ability to:

  • Install updates
  • Manage user accounts
  • Manage APIs
  • Manage devices
  • And more

After you’ve set up your Google Admin Console account, you can begin to research monitoring and classroom management software that fits your needs. 

Chromebooks and other Google resources offer ways for teachers to keep track of their students. 

For example:

  • Google Docs allows a teacher to keep track of their students’ work in real-time. 
  • Teachers can evaluate student progress. 
  • Teachers can communicate directly with students to answer questions or provide help if they fall behind. 

These are fairly basic services that are important to educators. There are also external management services that allow educators to keep students safe while receiving more specific data focused on how individual students learn and behave online. 

These detailed insights can also help determine if students are mastering core concepts.

These extensions and dashboards can provide greater protection to students and may enhance the learning capabilities of the Chromebooks themselves.

Why would more data be important? Here are some ways this data can be used:

  • Help students master core topics
  • Searches can be monitored
  • Cyberbullying suddenly becomes more visible 
  • Find out what students are interested in online
  • Learn how well students are retaining lessons and how they are collaborating with their peers
  • You may even be able to detect potential self-harm
chromebook management software for schools

5 Popular Chromebook Classroom Management Software Programs

#1: GoGuardian

GoGuardian allows users to unify filtering, classroom management, and school mental health tools in one suite. 

You can also identify students who are at risk of suicide or are a potential harm to others through evidence of cyberbullying and threats.

While reviews are not necessarily a unified source of truth, sifting through the pros and cons in review reports can be useful. 

Some pros of using GoGuardian include:

  • Quick and helpful customer support
  • The ability to access students activity on their Chromebooks in real-time
  • being able to help students during remote learning

Some cons of using GoGuardian include:

  • Some features are harder to set up for staff
  • Occasionally go guardian row block a site the students need to access to complete their work
  • The software can be occasionally limited and unreliable

GoGuardian Solution Features

Go guardian allows for video conferencing for K-12. Through this platform, teachers can deliver instruction one on one to students or as a class. 

These classes can be taught through:

  • Audio
  • Video 
  • Chat; and
  • Virtual lecture options

During classes, teachers can view what their students are doing on their devices even while video conferencing.

With GoGuardian Admin, they have launched a parent app that allows parents direct access to student online activity reports. Parents can access filtering controls. 

The last primary feature is GoGuardian Director. 

This feature allows you to track districtwide software usage. You can track usage trends and use this information to learn where your students are getting the most out of their devices.

How Much Does It Cost?

GoGuardian, like many management companies, charges per connected Chromebook. Their price point varies depending on how many Chromebooks you have enrolled in your school and which level of support you are looking for.

#2: Securly

Securly markets itself as a safety solution. With their cloud-based web filter and AI-based scanning system. It will scan:

  • Email
  • Google Docs; and
  • Google Drive

You’ll have full visibility of your students’ online activities. And you receive notifications of signs of:

  • Cyberbullying
  • Suicide; and
  • Nudity in images

Some reviews of Securly highlight these pros:

  • The system is easily integrated with Google for Education users
  • Securly is well-rated for mobile devices 1 to 1
  • Quality reporting of web activity 
  • Simple deployment

Here are some cons of using Securly:

  • There is no scheduling feature to change filtering policies and profiles
  • Syncing is a manual process
  • Pricing has increased over the years for Chrome devices

Securly Solution Features

Securly offers a few different bundles for schools to use that all take place on the cloud.  

Securly also includes mobile devices management for apple devices and identity checks for visitors. 

In addition to a lot of the common filtering technologies that are offered in these management programs, they also have a “find my Chromebooks” option which activates geolocation tracking driver school devices.

Securly focuses on risk assessment in students’ mental wellbeing and safety.

They also offer a parent app for all devices at home.

How Much Does It Cost?

Securly charges per user per year. For example:

  • A one-year contract for a school of 1,000 students costs $6,888, or $6.88 per user per year.
  • A one-year contract for a school of 500 students costs $3,850 per year or $7.70 per user per year.

They offer one-year contracts and multiple-year contracts at a 10% discount.

chromebook management software for schools

#3: Hāpara

Hāpara replicates teaching workflows on the cloud which includes:

  • Monitoring student work 
  • Instructional delivery
  • Lesson planning
  • Differentiating instruction
  • Providing formative feedback; and
  • Collaborating

Some pros of using Hāpara are:

  • Its ability to differentiate learning 
  • The experience seems generally positive.
  • Their Highlights feature allows you to send screenshots of students’ activities to the students to give them feedback on what they’re doing.
  • Teachers can create a list of websites for a class as a template and can lock them in for a specified time.

Some cons of using Hāpara are:

  • Students are sometimes “kicked out” of the pages they are accessing.
  • Setting up classrooms requires a bit of a learning curve however training is available for this.

Hāpara Solution Features

On their parent app, Hāpara allows parents to see:

  • Teacher expectations
  • Their child’s learning performance and grades
  • Alerts about missing assignments and teacher feedback
  • And more

Hāpara highlights its ability to differentiate learning. Each student learns differently, and their program allows you to personalize lessons to meet their needs.

How Much Does It Cost?

Hāpara pricing is based on student count, not devices and there are volume discounts and multi-year agreements available. The instructional suite starts at around $1500.

chromebook classroom management

#4: Impero

Impero is not just for school systems. They also serve these other industries:

  • Finance
  • Healthcare
  • Manufacturing; and
  • Retail 

For schools, Impero focuses on student safety and can intercept content in 45 different languages. 

Similar to the other management systems mentioned, they can spot trends in usage and monitor potentially vulnerable students. 

Some reported pros of using Impero for classrooms include:

  • Readily available support 
  • Easy to use interface

Some cons of Impero include:

  • There have been some issues with needing to reboot the Impero servers
  • With larger districts, there were some reported issues because of the limit of users per server.

Impero Solution Features

Impero Backdrop, one of Impero’s packages, allows schools to …

  • Record
  • Manage; and
  • Track

… student mental health and safety concerns.

Impero also offers these solutions for educators:

  • Impero Classroom – A classroom management software.
  • Impero Remote Control – The ability to access any device on the network as if you were there.
  • Impero Webcheck – A filtering system that also protects against virus-based threats.
  • Impero Wellbeing – Detection tools to monitor warning signs of harmful online behavior.

How Much Does It Cost?

Impero offers a free trial if you want to test it out. There was no information available on pricing, so it’s best to contact them for a quote directly. 

#5: Lightspeed Systems

Similar to other management systems, Lightspeed Systems offers school violence and suicide prevention and the ability to work with Mac OS, IOS, and Google Chrome programs. 

Lightspeed Systems Solution Features

Lightspeed Systems offers cheating prevention methods that allow you to set browsing restrictions and monitor plagiarism. 

They offer many of the same programs as other monitoring systems and market it as cheating prevention such as:

  • Real-time browsing alerts
  • browsing restrictions; and
  • A filter for plagiarism

How Much Does It Cost?

To get a quote from lightspeed Systems, you input your school district name, the approximate amount of devices you need to be connected to, and your preferred reseller. 

Their pricing is based on how many units you need to have managed.

Are There Free Chromebook Management Options?

Bark for Schools and Bark for Families is a great free option for families and schools. 

This free program offers many of the same monitoring abilities as the paid mentions here. They are dedicated to keeping their product free for individuals and districts to use.

Benefits of Chromebook Management Software for Schools

Having Chromebook management software allows you to bring virtual classrooms that much closer. 

In an increasingly virtual world, managing many students in one virtual classroom becomes easier with a management system in place.

Enroll Your School’s Chromebooks Easily With Go-Box

Go-Box makes the process of connecting to your students that much easier. 

Dealing with common issues that come with giving electronic equipment to thousands of students should be your only concern.

Don’t waste any more time or money on unreliable hacks that only cause more frustration or “white glove” services that cost far too much. 

Request a quote for your organization today to see how we can make your lives a little easier.

chromebook management software for schools