Google Classroom Connector: Remote Learning Made Easier

Technology will never replace a great teacher, but it can make teaching easier.  I am a working mom of a 5-year-old who has transitioned to remote learning on Google Classroom and Zoom for his PreK class. Like you, I have been challenged both personally and professionally by the transition to remote instruction.  The rapid pivot that many school districts made to continue to educate all learners amidst this global pandemic has been a testament to the ingenuity of teachers and the dedication of administrators.  The necessity to educate our students meant that districts introduced new tools without much professional development and a lack of data to understand whether and how students were engaging.  

At InnovateEDU, we believe there is tremendous power in using data to gain insight into student learning.  That’s why we decided to spend the last month building a free tool to unlock the data from individual Google Classrooms into consolidated reports. 

InnovateEDU is offering a free, open-source data extraction tool--The Google Classroom Connector-- to any school or district that utilizes G Suite for Education.

 InnovateEDU is a non-profit organization with a mission to close the achievement gap in K-12 public education by developing and using innovative models and tools to support teaching and learning technology.  

We realized that schools and districts are faced with one of education’s most significant changes to date. Questions such as how many students are completing their assignments, how attendance should be tracked remotely, or what classes are being taught are consuming many teachers’ and administrators’ minds. We created this tool to address some of those concerns.

Once schools or districts run this low code Google Classroom Connector in their Google Cloud environment, they will be able to: 

  • Bring all of their Google Classroom data to one place in Google BigQuery;

  • Gain access to data ranging from the number of classes created to the percentage of students who have completed their assignments; and

  • Copy and use our Data Studio report template or create their own reports to visualize student data.

Setting up the Google Classroom Connector requires a few steps that can be completed by someone with little to moderate technical know-how.  To support schools and districts in this process, InnovateEDU is offering free training materials and webinars to support schools and districts looking to adopt this tool. 

Google Classroom Connector works with SQL-connected business intelligence apps such as  Tableau, Google Data Studio, Power BI or Looker. 

For any schools, districts, or organizations that are new to this, it is time to rethink the way you gather, analyze, and process your most important data. InnovateEDU is here to help.

Joshua Lutkus