Ian Boland, a sophomore at MCHS, sits in his Spanish II class after submitting his listening test through Schoology. Stressed as can be, he sits in his seat silent as everyone else is finishing up. His friend sitting behind him breaks the silence and whispers. “Bro, what’d you get?” Boland opens Powerschool on his chromebook to find his grade unchanged, only inducing the stress factor. Again, his friend whispers “No, check Bessy. The grade is already in there.”
Bessy is a free platform that you can open in a regular browser or download and it helps students track their Schoology or Infinite Campus grades. It offers additional features like a grade calculator and grade simulation. Students can see their growth in numbers and charts along with the math behind their peaks and troughs.
“On Powerschool you can’t edit your grades like you do on Bessy,” sophomore Eva Smith says. “Obviously, it won’t change your actual grade but it can help you visualize what your grade would be like if you were to do better on a certain assignment. The grade calculator is most useful for finals.”
Over 85,000 students nationwide use Bessy to keep track of their grades, and use Bessy’s other perks.
MCHS has recently made the switch from Schoology to Powerschool to access your grades. Now, students do their work in Schoology and have to view their grades on Powerschool but because they are two separate platforms the transmission is sometimes slow to update.
“I like Bessy because it updates my grades right away when I finish an online assignment or right when a teacher enters a new score,” sophomore Marin Koleno says. “It updates much faster than Powerschool and tells me more about the grade in general.”
The only thing Powerschool does that Bessy can’t do is provide students with personal information like their contacts, payments and how much money is under their accounts. Otherwise students prefer to use Bessy when it comes to grades.
“I don’t even use Powerschool anymore, it’s kind of confusing,” sophomore DAngelo Davis says, “I only use Bessy.”
It’s unlikely MCHS would stop paying for having access to Powerschool because that’s how parents of students access their information, even though Powerschool doesn’t link to any other platforms like Bessy and Schoology do.
“I also have Bessy downloaded on my phone so I can track my grades wherever,” Boland says. “It’s just nice to be able to see my grades updated up to the second whenever I want or need it.”
After checking Bessy, Boland sees his new grade after submitting his test. He can see how much it affected his grade using the chart. He eases back into his chair now knowing he doesn’t have to spend all day stressing, wondering what grade he got.