Microsoft partners Chalkup to improve classroom education

San Francisco: Microsoft has partnered with classroom collaboration startup Chalkup to drive better learning experiences for students globally. As part of the collaboration, Microsoft will bring the best of the Chalkup features, like it's original rubrics system, to make it easier to assess and grade student assignments into "Microsoft Teams".

The move is a part of the tech giant's continued investment to "help save teachers time, build collaborative classrooms and drive better learning outcomes for students," Eran Megiddo, CVP, Education said in a blogpost on Tuesday. Microsoft has also hired Chalkup Co-founder Justin Chando. Like Chalkup, "Microsoft Teams" includes seamless class discussions, chat and integrated assignments and grading functionality, including Microsoft learning tools.

These are free tools that implement proven techniques to improve reading and writing for students regardless of their age or ability. Chalkup was co-founded in 2013 by Chando to build a more compelling digital classroom experience for all students.  "In spending time with the amazing people at Microsoft, it was clear that we were completely aligned in our mission for connecting classrooms, sparking student collaboration, and finding new and innovative ways to work together," Chando said. 

"We knew Microsoft would be a great fit and we're thrilled for what the future holds for our customers," he added. Chalkup will be ending its services on June 30, 2018 and its customers will have continued support through the end of June and an easy transition path to Microsoft Teams, the post said. 

The existing customers of Chalkup will be able to continue to run their courses until the school year ends in June and then will have an easy transition path to Microsoft Teams. Chalkup is no longer accepting new sign ups, effective immediately. Microsoft began its Teams for Education collaboration service in March 2017. It is a free add-on to Office 365 Education for users with an Education, Education Plus, Education E3 and/or an Education E5 suite plan.