In 2020, more schools optimized app and content discovery by enabling Sora’s cross-platform connections

 

 

CLEVELAND – January 26, 2021 – With students learning remotely and digital book usage skyrocketing, schools have invested in many new online platforms. This growing trend elevates the need to integrate those systems so educators can effectively manage their classroom and spend more time teaching.

In 2020, teachers dramatically increased their usage of the Sora student reading app’s integrations with their existing edtech systems. These integrations, made at the direction of school administrators, allow ebooks and audiobooks to flow in rhythm with how students and educators work, enabling teachers to assign titles, and simplifying how students find and borrow digital books. Sora was created by OverDrive Education, the leading digital reading platform for 44,000 schools worldwide.

From the start of 2020, thousands of school partners requested and authorized integrations between Sora and LMS (Learning Management Systems), ILS (Integrated Library System) and LOR (Learning Object Repository) systems to enable how students and teachers work. Since April 2020, more than 4,500 schools installed the Sora app in their Schoology platform, and the number of schools that used Sora’s rostering integration to assign books, such as via Clever or ClassLink, more than doubled. With Google Classroom now dominating the LMS category, Sora + Google authentication setups also saw a spike, growing to 36% of all Sora sign in methods. Last year teachers shared titles or curated book collections directly to Google Classrooms more than 7,000 times using Sora’s built in share feature.

“Many schools made significant capital expenditures in digital infrastructure so they could manage remote learning,” said Angela Arnold, General Manager of OverDrive Education. “They want to maximize that investment by selecting products and services that play well together.”

Teachers leveraged Sora’s edtech integrations in three ways: app discovery, content discovery and rostering. These functions insert digital reading seamlessly into the places where school users log in every day, such as single sign-on (SSO) authentication systems, app launchers and platforms where assignments are created and viewed. When schools integrate Sora in these ways, it eliminates barriers to accessing digital books, lets teachers work in systems they’re familiar with, and keeps digital content front and center for students.

Arnold continued, “Many educators report that SSO-friendly apps and integrations like those offered by Sora are table stakes in 2021. Educators are overburdened by multiple logins, and they don’t want apps that function outside their core tools—no matter how good they may be. They love the simplicity of one tap reading.”

OverDrive Education is presenting “How Digital Content Fosters Inclusivity and Equity” at FETC on January 26 from 1-1:45pm ET. This presentation can be viewed at https://www.fetc.org/ until February 28.

Learn more information about Sora and get started here.

 

About OverDrive Education – a division of OverDrive

OverDrive Education offers the industry’s largest catalog of ebooks, audiobooks and streaming video for 44,000 K-12 schools worldwide. The company’s student reading app, Sora, helps schools embrace the future of reading, providing 24/7 access to books and powerful learning tools and insights to meet the needs of students and educators. Sora was named one of TIME’s Best Inventions of 2019. Founded in 1986, OverDrive – the leading digital reading platform for libraries – and OverDrive Education are based in Cleveland, Ohio USA. www.overdrive.com/schools

 
Contact:
David Burleigh
Director of Brand Marketing & Communications
dburleigh@overdrive.com

 

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