Technical difficulties with Edgenuity puts students behind

The pandemic has caused many students and teachers to become frustrated and stressed with online learning. Bettendorf High School is using Edgenuity as part of the online curriculum for students that decided to go all online.

Edgenuity is another learning platform, like Canvas and Google Classroom, that provides online classes for students who are working from their homes. It helps students make up any credit that they may need in order to graduate on time.

The website has presented some technical issues that have caused students to become frustrated. Most students were unable to access the website for the first two weeks of the quarter.

The associate principal of BHS, Kevin Skillet, said that Edgenuity was ready for BHS on Monday, August 31st, but it took the first week to set up courses, student enrollments and student and staff training.

Due to a few technical issues, student username and passwords were not emailed directly from Edgenuity. Because of this, BHS staff had to provide the passwords directly to students, causing some to fall behind.

Because the delay puts students behind on their work, many spend most of their weekends trying to catch up on missing assignments.

“Last weekend I spent 19 hours on Edgenuity, I went from having 67 missing assignments to 37,” said Otts, “but I was then put more behind the next day by at least five new assignments that got posted the day before.”

The website has been plenty stressful for everyone, but faculty and staff members are doing the best they can to guide students in the right direction.

“I think that as we continue to learn more and more about the program it will allow opportunities for students to earn initial credit recovery online,” said Skillett.

Students may be having trouble navigating through the website, but it has its benefits.

“In my opinion, Edgenuity is a good website, but it has brought a lot of stress to the situation we are in today,” said Dakota Otts.

Otts is a Junior taking English 11 on Edgenuity to earn credits for her composition writing class.

“I think that Edgenuity has some really good qualities, and as we work through learning this program, it will be a great resource for BHS,” said Danielle Breier, a school counselor at BHS.