Lindamood-Bell uses FormAssembly to power lesson plans, student records, and quality control across 65+ learning centers.

Lindamood-Bell

Lindamood-Bell teaches children and adults reading and comprehension. Lindamood-Bell® Learning Centers use intensive, research-validated instruction to help students of all ages and levels, no matter their skill or learning challenge.

The Challenge

For years, Lindamood-Bell relied on paper forms to implement their 1-on-1 instruction. The staff used paper and pen for simple forms such as intake information, and more intricate processes, like individual lesson plans. Each student received a new lesson plan every day, which meant the staff wrote thousands of pages by hand. The lesson plans involve multiple steps, which staff had to memorize or reference each time they needed to create a new plan.

When staff exchanged lesson plans across Lindamood-Bell’s 65 learning centers, they sank even more time into continually re-writing paper forms. “There was so much paper. And they were scanning these pieces of paper to someone who would make changes on it, then fax it back, back and forth,” said Elizabeth.

The process was “a time waster” — not just for the instructors, but for the support staff who had to manually re-enter the data into Salesforce.

And because student files were stored physically, if a staff member or manager needed to access a specific record, she would have to travel to a particular location in order to review the file. “Someone would have to go and dig in and read the pieces of paper on-site,” said Elizabeth.

The paper system was costing them significant time and resources.

The Solution

Use Case: Student Intake Forms

At first, Elizabeth and her team needed a basic survey tool for intake paperwork. During student enrollment, parents would provide student information on paper, which required double data entry into Salesforce. Now parents can fill out the FormAssembly form, which automatically connects to and updates the Salesforce data. “We were very excited about it,” said Elizabeth. “It’s such a great product and so reasonably priced.”

She was especially impressed by FormAssembly’s quick setup. “I’m not a technical person at all, but I did it just like that. It was so fast and easy to use.”

Use Case: Lesson Plans

After the successful implementation, Elizabeth realized FormAssembly was the answer to another problem. Staff needed an electronic way to create lesson plans, but the info was stored in a legacy SQL server database. In order to create a solution, they’d need to hire many additional developers to work around the clock.

With FormAssembly, Elizabeth created a web form that allows staff to choose lesson steps from dropdown menus. Staff can create lesson plans easily and efficiently, adding steps in just a few clicks. “It’s improved quality and reduced training time,” said Elizabeth. “It’s changed so much for us.”

Since Lindamood-Bell started using the new lesson plan system in the beginning of June, they’ve processed over 50,000 responses — equal to over 50,000 handwritten pages.

FormAssembly’s integrations also let educators staff print the lesson plan for the student’s file, which is much easier for other teachers staff members to read. “There’s so much time saved on so many different levels,” said Elizabeth.

Use Case: Student Records

Lindamood-Bell discovered an unexpected benefit with FormAssembly: since the web forms feed directly into Salesforce, all of the student data is now available online. Support staff and management can review student records remotely, without needing to travel on-site or rely on scanned documents. “We have locations all over the globe, so this is great for us,” said Elizabeth.

Additionally, because each student has a complete electronic record attached to their Salesforce account, it’s easy for staff to create reports and analyze student progress.

Use Case: Quality Control

Through FormAssembly, Lindamood-Bell achieves greater standards of accountability and transparency. Staff can measure and make changes to lesson plans immediately. If there are any red flags or concerns raised, departments can drill down into student records and instantly fix issues.

And, for the first time, FormAssembly has opened the door to quality control. Thanks to the complete student records and activity logs, Lindamood-Bell staff can evaluate necessary improvements with a granular level of detail that wasn’t possible before. “We’re so, so thrilled with it. It’s super efficient and saves us so much time,” said Elizabeth.

Elizabeth said FormAssembly has boosted their results, which is a tremendous win for their mission. “We’re changing people’s lives, helping their self-confidence and their ability to graduate from high school.”

The Future

Currently, student enrollment forms are created as Word documents that require wet signatures. Elizabeth plans to use FormAssembly’s Salesforce Prefill Connector to generate online enrollment forms with E-Signatures. “Right now, we spend so much time tracking down these signatures,” said Elizabeth.

Lindamood-Bell looks forward to accomplishing more with FormAssembly. “We are blown away. We love it.”