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Clickers next step on your campus?

Bad news for the clicker software. They no longer support the free application we've been using. They moved to a Cloud-base, licensed model. The current version will continue to work, but if anything stops, there is no way to update to fix it. We can't even download the version we're using from their site anymore. So no updates, and the application already failed in a classroom.

The application itself works if you build the polls using the in-app tools. However, if you try to use the plugin for PowerPoint, the plugin never loads. So any existing polls are unusable. The plugin for PowerPoint was always a bit ad-hoc and broke frequently with Windows Updates.

I'm reaching out because i wanted to discuss how to move forward. This company is not steadfast/stable in their support of things their customers have purchased from them. Discontinuing a product a few years after someone just spent hundreds of dollars on that product without warning is very poor practice. The question then becomes, do we buy in further (licensing) or cut our losses and change systems?

We can continue to use the current version we have, but there is no more support for PowerPoint. Other polling technologies I'm seeing don't support PPT either and have you build the question banks in-app. However, most are moving to a web platform in general.

Most require licensing for mobile.

AHHHHHH what are YOU doing about this on YOUR campus?

Thanks

Hope

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Permalink Reply by Andrea Grace MacArgel on March 28, 2016 at 12:17pm

Hi Hope,

Which software do you all use? i>clicker? That's our system on campus. I hadn't heard the comany was no longer supporting the software.

Andrea

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Permalink Reply by Hope Windle on April 23, 2016 at 5:39pm

the Turning Technology company's software for their clicker hardware.
https://www.turningtechnologies.com/higher-education

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Permalink Reply by Martha V. Gold on March 30, 2016 at 9:03am

Clickers are a great tool for collecting data on students in face-to-face classrooms, but there is a lot of other software out there that accomplishes the same tasks. Here is what faculty are using on our campus -

Note - these work in rooms that at the very least have some cell phone reception.

Poll Everywhere - This is software that faculty can use to develop individual questions (it offers multiple choice, T/F, free form text). Responses are given via Smartphones, tablets, computers or other mobile devices. Instead of purchasing clickers, schools can purchase additional phones to use as response vehicles.

Plickers - This is free, free, free. It uses paper cards for responding. However, I found it is slow and cumbersome in getting the answers.

Google Forms - this is probably better for online as one cannot respond via text, but it's great for classes in computer labs.

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Permalink Reply by Hope Windle on April 23, 2016 at 5:41pm

thanks Martha !! Great ideas !!

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Permalink Reply by Ian August on July 13, 2016 at 10:07am

Hi Hope,

I just playing around with google forms, that creates survey's in seconds. My plan is to use them instead of clickers and have students pull out their devices.