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A Guide to Google Workspace for Students

by Alexa Sander on December 5, 2024

Google Workspace exists to “Empower educators with tools to transform education.” It’s one of the foremost technologies that has played a pivotal role in transforming classrooms over the past decade.

As we look forward to the tomorrow of education technology (EdTech), Google Workspace is positioned to continue playing a central part.

Read on to learn why more than 150 million students and educators choose Google Workspace. Plus, we’ll look into the potential risks it presents to schools and how your institution can effectively mitigate them.

What is Google Workspace?

Google Workspace is a collection of cloud-based productivity and collaboration applications, developed by Google. It includes tools commonly used for everyday purposes, from Gmail and Google Calendar to Groups, Sites, and Drive.

For classroom environments specifically, Google highlights the following education tools offered by Google Workspace:

Google Classroom: As a leading virtual learning platform, Google Classroom is a technology that allows teachers to create, distribute, and grade assignments seamlessly.

Google Meet: Once used purely for remote learning, teachers now use Google Meet for parent-teacher conferences, professional development, virtual field trips, and more.

Google Assignments: While assignments are traditionally time-consuming and manually intensive, Google Assignments streamlines distribution, grading, and feedback processes.

Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides: Using these e-documentation education tools, both students and teachers can benefit from enhanced productivity and organization. As Google puts it, students and educators can “Seamlessly collaborate in real time using Docs, Sheets, and Slides.”

Google Workspace also offers Gemini, a generative AI model. On Gemini, Google says it’s “an AI assistant across Google Workspace for Education that helps you save time, create captivating learning experiences, and inspire fresh ideas — all in a private and secure environment.”

The upside to Google Workspace for students

K-12 schools adopt some or all of Google’s tools for teaching and learning to offer greater access to educational materials, facilitate collaboration among students and teachers, enhance communication with parents, and ultimately open the door to improved learning outcomes.

Its centralized repository of tools is not only trusted by hundreds of millions of schools across the globe but has become increasingly central to day-to-day classroom operations.

Few other classroom solutions offer the breadth and depth of tools offered by Google Workspace — with tools for collaboration, administration, documentation, content creation, reporting, and more. Plus, it seamlessly integrates with existing systems and is notably easy to deploy.

The downside to Google Workspace

While Google Workspace offers a range of upsides, there are several risks for every school district to be aware of. These risks aren’t necessarily due to the fault of the technology itself, but instead how it’s used and configured. By using technology incorrectly and without the necessary protective measures, your school district could open the door to cybersecurity risks, student safety risks, and students gaining access to harmful content.

Particularly on the cybersecurity side, schools are among the most vulnerable, highly targeted groups. The average cyberattack in the education sector costs $3.65m, according to IBM. Even beyond sole financial risks, cyber breaches open the door to reputational, operational, and legal costs.

Google Workspace offers its own protection mechanisms — both for cybersecurity and online activity monitoring. However, many K-12 schools are taking a necessary additional step to adopt next-generation risk mitigation tools.

Secure your Google Workspace with ManagedMethods

Schools trust ManagedMethods for its next-generation, cloud-based content filtering and Google Workspace monitoring solutions — relied on by schools across the United States for safeguarding their Google Workspace usage. Specifically, through its suite of solutions, ManagedMethods offers schools:

Enhanced data security: Cloud Monitor monitors and detects improper sharing and access to sensitive data stored in Google Workspace. Whether it’s an internal data leak caused by improper sharing practices or an external breach from a malicious actor, Cloud Monitor will automatically detect and remedy the situation.

Improved vulnerability management: The software scans Gmail and Google Drive for vulnerabilities, allowing schools to identify and remediate security risks before they lead to data breaches.

Optimized account monitoring: ManagedMethods’ technology provides 24/7 monitoring of login locations, file sharing, and download activities with customizable policies — enabling automatic detection and response to suspicious account behaviors.

ManagedMethods’ suite of solutions includes Content Filter, Cloud Monitoring, and soon-to-be-released Classroom Manager.

Content Filter is a cloud-based filtering solution that can be easily deployed and seamlessly integrates with your existing network infrastructure to manage and control internet access. It equips administrators with robust tools to configure filtering rules, monitor web traffic in real-time, and generate comprehensive usage reports.

Cloud Monitor is a state-of-the-art cloud security platform that seamlessly integrates with Google Workspace and Microsoft 365, providing continuous monitoring and advanced threat detection. It empowers administrators to efficiently manage access controls, oversee user activities in real time, and enforce robust security policies across a diverse range of cloud applications.

To further enhance classroom security and safety, ManagedMethods is excited to announce the upcoming launch of Classroom Manager, a cutting-edge software solution designed specifically for K-12 schools.

FAQs about Google Workspace

Here are answers to common questions on Google Workspace for schools.

How do I set up Google Workspace for my school?

Setting up Google Workspace for your school involves the following steps:

Request approval: Visit the Google Workspace sign-up page. Then, fill out the necessary details about your institution to initiate the approval process.

Verify domain ownership: After submitting your request, verify that the domain you intend to use belongs to your organization. This typically involves adding a verification record to your domain’s DNS settings.

Await eligibility review: Google will review your organization’s eligibility based on the provided information and domain verification. The approval process usually takes up to 14 business days.

Set up your organization: Once approved, you can add users (educator, student, staff) to your domain. You can also set up and customize Google Workspace apps to your specific needs.

Is Google Workspace secure?

Yes, Google Workspace includes robust security features to protect your school’s data. It employs advanced encryption for data both in transit and at rest, ensuring information remains secure during transfer and storage. Plus, tools like Single Sign-On and 2-Step Verification provide additional layers of protection against unauthorized access.

The Google Admin Console allows administrators to manage security settings, monitor user activities, and generate audit reports effectively. Furthermore, Google’s data centers are known for their strong physical security and redundancy measures.

With that said, it’s important for schools to recognize their own role in ensuring their security. With ManagedMethods, school administrators gain easy-to-use and simply deployable tools to streamline security management, enhance configuration controls, ensure complete visibility, and maintain compliance — all while keeping IT costs low.

How safe is Google Drive for students?

While no platform can guarantee absolute security, Google Drive offers a reliable and secure solution for storing and managing student data.

According to Google: “Keeping you safe online means protecting your information and respecting your privacy. That’s why, in every product we create, we prioritize securing your information, handling it responsibly, and ensuring you remain in control. Our teams work tirelessly to make Google products safe no matter what you’re doing — whether it’s browsing the web, managing your inbox, or getting directions.”

Trusted by over 2 billion active monthly users, including government agencies, financial institutions, educational organizations, and other entities that regularly handle sensitive data, Google Drive is a largely dependable platform for your student’s data management needs.

As an added security barrier, K-12 schools can implement strict data control policies, train employees on data handling best practices, and regularly audit sharing settings and access logs to help identify and rectify potential exposures before they lead to data breaches. Moreover, they can rely on next-generation yet cost-effective cybersecurity and cloud monitoring software.