Switch to unifying education technology
liberates Cary Academy with greater
freedom and flexibility

Located in the heart of North Carolina’s “Research Triangle,” Cary Academy
aims to cultivate “self-directed and bold life-long learners,” with a mission
built on four key principles: discovery, innovation, collaboration, and
excellence—which the school community refers to simply as DICE.

The campus incorporates a 22,000-square foot Center for Math and Science,
state-of-the-art video production, 3-D printer makerspace, and even a
hammock hangout. Students help create their own off-campus experiential learning opportunities through the Center for Community Engagement, and
for the two-week Discovery Term in May, they help create and lead courses.
Likewise, Cary Academy’s teachers enjoy autonomy to try new ideas and
pedagogical techniques. Yet, this created challenges as the tech-savvy
faculty and staff adopted a variety of disparate software and applications for
enrollment management, student information, and learning management.
Over time, Cary Academy recognized the need for a total school solution
with streamlined, integrated technology products. They ultimately chose
Blackbaud to power learning success—but only after struggling with another
provider that confined users and failed to support the school’s mission,
including the collaborative spirit that’s part of Cary Academy’s DNA.

Frustrated by Restrictions, Bottlenecks

In 2015, Cary Academy started to implement a total school solution that
quickly caused concerns.

“What we found immediately was that the solution was very restrictive in
what we were able to do and able to customize,” said Karen McKenzie, who
joined as director of technology and innovation around the same time.
“There were a lot of pieces that didn’t work well for our community.”
As an example, McKenzie pointed to a central classroom function: making
assignments. With its emphasis on innovation, Cary Academy offers close
to 100 assignment types, more than a usual school. But Cary Academy
couldn’t streamline the software’s menu by organizing options into
groups—or even create separate lists for middle-school and upper-school
assignments.

Over time, the limits of the provider’s software and setup grew clearer. The
company assigned a single liaison to the school, creating a bottleneck for
questions and customer support requests. And as teachers transitioned
to a new school year, those who had gone “all in” with the new learning
management system found they couldn’t transfer bulletin boards,
assignments and other resources from one year to the next.

The system even undermined Cary Academy’s mission.

McKenzie heard complaints from teachers that it ran counter to innovative
pedagogical approaches. Changes and adaptations didn’t seem possible
for users unless “the whole ship moved,” inhibiting discovery. And users
faced tech roadblocks as they tried to work together on projects. “That
collaboration piece—that’s where it really fell off for us,” McKenzie said.

Transformative Benefits for All Stakeholders

McKenzie began to consider other technology providers, including
Blackbaud, which offers a comprehensive suite of best-in-class offerings to
manage the entire education lifecycle. While she had worked with those
solutions at her previous school, she invited other stakeholders to help
determine whether Blackbaud was the right fit for Cary Academy. They
explored Blackbaud’s education offerings thoroughly, saw greater flexibility
and a more user-friendly interface for administrators, faculty, families, and
students, and collectively agreed to switch.

“Blackbaud presented the possibilities that we just didn’t have in the other
system,” McKenzie explained. “The academic side was night and day for us”
The transformation Cary Academy experienced after adopting Blackbaud
Learning Management System™️, Blackbaud Student Information System™️,
and Blackbaud Enrollment Management System™️ has benefited all
stakeholders and most importantly student learning. “We have heard so
much positive feedback from families since adopting Blackbaud’s Total
School Solution.”

McKenzie shared that with Blackbaud education management solutions
and a technology infrastructure that can stretch and grow, the school is
now experiencing:

• Meaningful partnership: Cary Academy has a team at Blackbaud ready
to assist with questions and facilitate success—not just one contact.
Faculty praise Blackbaud support, training, and resources, including the
Knowledgebase search engine, where they can often find quick answers.
They also appreciate that Blackbaud’s education technology team has
taken their ideas and implemented them in product improvements.

• Customized dashboards and content: Dashboards relate to the
stakeholder’s role in the school community and can be further
personalized, so content is more relevant to users from the moment
they log-in.

• Satisfied teachers: Teachers who exclusively use Blackbaud education
management products are happy with them. Faculty especially like
how they can tailor bulletin board topics, resources, and assignments,
including the way students see their assignments and turn work in.
Even those who aren’t “all in” rely on Blackbaud and can tie in other
educational tech tools into Blackbaud’s framework easily. “Blackbaud
has become the tool, the point of record, the place we want it to be,”
McKenzie said.

• Streamlined family experience: Parents and guardians are more
engaged than ever with the school online and find it easy to keep up
with their students’ assignments and progress. “We were able to say,
‘Everything is going to be in Blackbaud,’ and the reason we were able to
say that was because of the flexibility it allows our teachers.”

• Empowered school community: Administration and faculty can
communicate with each other and families more effectively, and the
Parent Teacher Administration Alliance (PTAA) has embraced Blackbaud’s
resource boards.

• Innovative scheduling: While schedule sets were a past sticking point,
Blackbaud has allowed administrators to try variations they wouldn’t
have dreamed of attempting before and now “couldn’t live without.”

• An assignment center that works for kids: The assignment center’s
student view has been a huge win. “Kids absolutely loved when we
moved over to Blackbaud’s assignment center,” McKenzie said. “The
ability to track the status of their own assignments and create individual
tasks helped our kids tremendously, especially those with executive
functioning difficulties.”

• Expanded capabilities with trusted partners: The community has
leveraged additional solutions available through the Blackbaud
Marketplace, such as Visitu, which simplified check-ins and check-outs.

• Next-level collaboration: User groups can be created with levels of
permissions and assigned role identities, driving collaboration across the
school with greater engagement. That includes the students who help
design special Discovery Term courses in May. Plus, content ownership
can be transferred to other stakeholders to invite further engagement
and delegate work.

With these advances, Blackbaud education management is fulfilling its
promise of powering discovery, innovation, collaboration and excellence
at Cary Academy as the school forges a dynamic future. “Blackbaud’s Total
School Solution understands independent schools,” McKenzie said, “and
allows us the flexibility to live out our mission statement.”