Alfa Fundación in Monterrey, Mexico runs its digital classroom through alfafundacion.schoology.com. The name suggests a specialized product, but Schoology Alfa is standard Schoology software with institutional branding.
The foundation serves 5,521 students through three junior high centers, one high school, and university scholarships. Current enrollment: 858 junior high students, 467 high school students, 701 university scholars. The program has graduated 162 university students as of 2023.
Students gain admission through assessment tests measuring academic ability and creativity. All come from economically disadvantaged families in the Monterrey metropolitan area. ALFA, a major Mexican industrial group, funds the operation.
Table of Contents
Platform Origins
Jeremy Friedman, Ryan Hwang, and Tim Trinidad built Schoology in 2007 while studying at Washington University in St. Louis. The three undergraduates wanted better note-sharing tools than their university provided.
After graduating in 2009, they launched Schoology commercially. K-12 teachers adopted it faster than higher education institutions, drawn to interface design that resembled Facebook rather than clunky enterprise software. The platform raised $57 million in venture capital by 2015.
By 2019, Schoology served 20 million users across 1,800 school districts. PowerSchool acquired the company on November 25, 2019 for an undisclosed sum. Moody’s reported the deal involved a $70 million loan and equity from Vista Equity Partners and Onex Corporation, PowerSchool’s owners.
PowerSchool runs student information systems for 45 million students in 13,000 districts. CEO Hardeep Gulati said the acquisition would connect learning management with attendance tracking, grading, and assessment tools in one system.
How It Works
Teachers build courses by uploading documents, videos, and presentations. Students submit assignments digitally. Automated grading handles tests and quizzes. Discussion forums replace classroom conversations when needed. Parents get access to grades and attendance without calling teachers.
The platform runs on web browsers and mobile apps. Schools can disable features like private student messaging or restrict file types based on safety policies.
Market Context
Schoology competes with Canvas, Google Classroom, Moodle, Blackboard, and Brightspace. Market share stood at 14 to 17 percent among small and mid-sized districts in 2019. Canvas dominates higher education. Google Classroom offers free basic features but lacks advanced grading and analytics.
PowerSchool had previously acquired Haiku Learning in 2016, another learning management system that never exceeded 5 percent market share. Schoology brought proven scale and district trust that PowerSchool couldn’t build with Haiku.
The Branding Question
Schools deploy Schoology under custom domains with institutional names. Students at different schools use identical software but identify it by their school’s branding. Alfa Fundación students see it as Schoology Alfa. Another district’s students might call it by their school name.
This happens across educational technology. Districts spend substantial money on platforms but want them to feel locally owned, not like vendor products. Custom domains and branded login pages create that perception.
The naming matters less than whether the system delivers course materials reliably and tracks student progress accurately. Alfa Fundación picked Schoology because it met their educational model requirements, not because any special version existed for their needs.
