Canvas Partner Spotlight: How KickUp Helps K-12 Organizations Maximize Professional Learning Impact

Educators are the facilitators of student learning–and in order to do that critical job well, they need to always keep learning themselves! A high-quality professional learning management system can be a huge help to K-12 leaders in effectively delivering professional learning opportunities to their staff. But for educators who always have too much on their to-do lists, convenience is key to professional learning that works.

That’s why KickUp partnered with Canvas LMS, the most used learning management system, that’s already the day-to-day hub of teaching and learning trusted by many K-12 districts and educators. By integrating KickUp and Canvas LMS via API, educators are able to quickly and easily access their professional learning in a single click. Convenience = completion.

But, convenience isn’t the only criteria savvy administrators need to consider when thinking about professional learning delivery. At KickUp, we focus solely on professional learning, so we know a thing or two about what high-quality looks like. By pairing our specific expertise with the reach and easy access of Canvas, we help K-12 institutions complete the cycle of professional learning across the entire district. And we want to share some of that professional learning expertise with you.

When evaluating a professional learning management system for your district, pay special attention to these four dimensions:

1.  Efficiency, starting from event creation through to feedback analysis

KickUp Learning, KickUp’s robust Professional Learning Management System, streamlines every aspect of developing and managing a professional learning program, including the ability to:

• Create professional learning events, both in-person and asynchronous, directly linked to any Canvas LMS course
• Find the required and optional professional learning events most relevant to every educator
• Register for professional learning events in a single click
• Build attendance reports to know exactly who has and hasn’t attended
• Collect and analyze PD feedback by event, facilitator, school, and more.

When paired with Canvas LMS, staff and administrators see efficiencies that weren’t possible in other systems. Educators no longer have to use multiple tools and logins to access and engage in professional learning. Our integration works like this: administrators define course completion requirements (once all modules are completed, selected modules are completed, or enrollment concludes), educators register for professional learning in KickUp directly linking them to any Canvas course, they learn in Canvas LMS with tools that elevate engagement, and completion status is seamlessly synced in both.

2. Visibility for classroom teachers, site leaders, and district-level administrators

Classroom teachers are empowered to be more independent in their learning journeys with access to a highly tailored list of professional learning opportunities. Educators can search the catalog of learning opportunities by their specific demographics, receive notifications of events, view their professional learning schedules, access their own transcripts, and confirm their own attendance. Canvas LMS makes it easy to engage while KickUp makes it easy to know where they’ve been and where they’re headed.

Site leaders can both access and customize feedback heatmaps in their preferred groups by school, individual, content area, grade level, facilitator and more. These heat maps make it clear to site leaders in real-time how educators feel professional learning has impacted their practice and provide visibility into what follow-up supports are being requested.

District-level administrators not only have the ability to gain a comprehensive overview of professional learning across the district, down to individual levels, but they also can ensure that others access the correct information through precise controls. They can designate specific individuals to view, manage, and edit the professional learning catalog. Moreover, they can differentiate the PD catalog based on roles, buildings, and other criteria by specifying which events are visible to all users, certain groups, or individuals.

3. Real-time, robust reporting

KickUp Learning provides unparalleled access to robust information and reports in real-time, revolutionizing the way educators and district leaders track professional development. Gone are the days where a “spreadsheet wizard” is required to manipulate and analyze data to gain insight into the impact of your professional learning program. KickUp’s comprehensive reporting features puts the data you need at your fingertips and leads you quickly to the most important insights and action steps to further the impact of your professional learning program.

With automatic syncing, the integration eliminates duplicate work when tracking professional learning registration, attendance, completion, and credits. Because administrators no longer have to manually transfer information and manipulate spreadsheets to understand what professional learning has and hasn’t been completed, they can spend more time focused on the learning itself.

4. Connections and integrations

When educator growth tools aren’t integrated, administrators can’t pull data from all their initiatives into one report. Instead, they have siloed reports with separate pieces of data in different formats, inhibiting speedy insight gathering and well-rounded decision making. KickUp provides the tools that bring all your data into one place for holistic analysis, so you can shorten the decision-making timeline. Tell the story of professional growth at your district using, not only professional learning data, but all aspects of an educator’s professional learning journey. KickUp offers coherence in that journey by connecting professional learning to what's happening in mentorship, coaching and PLCs, and what's being observed in classroom walkthroughs. We also offer an integrated performance evaluation system. There's no more need for endless meetings to discuss siloed systems because administrators can share access to the right information with the right people so they can participate in conversations about what’s working and what needs to be improved.

Catch the Webinar Replay

Discover how KickUp Learning can streamline every aspect of developing and managing your professional learning program by viewing the on-demand webinar.

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About KickUp

KickUp offers the leading educator success platform, providing K-12 school districts with a comprehensive view of educator growth and development. KickUp is an indispensable partner to district administrators, principals, and instructional coaches who use the platform to maximize the impact of professional learning and increase teacher effectiveness and retention. KickUp is the only educator success platform to combine a professional learning management system, teacher evaluation, and the tools necessary to enhance and monitor instructional coaching and learning walks.