AtlasOA Frequently Asked Questions

AtlasOA is a modern outcomes assessment platform for higher education. It tracks Student Learning Outcomes, supports accreditation evidence collection (HLC, SACSCOC, MSCHE, NWCCU, WSCUC, ACCJC), and maps curriculum. AtlasOA, LLC also publishes Atlas K-12, a separate program for K-12 districts that replicates the core functionality of Panorama Education's Student Success platform.

We do not run sales demos. You evaluate AtlasOA hands-on. Request the free 30-day trial package: a Windows installer, a license key with every module unlocked, and a step-by-step Evaluation Guide with screenshots. Install it on a PC or server your institution owns, load a built-in sample program in the first five minutes, then explore at your own pace and load your own de-identified data. The 30 days start when you activate the key. The sample datasets and CSV templates are downloadable with no signup.

AtlasOA is built and maintained by Ashley Reddick, an IT instructor at a technical college in the Midwest. Ashley teaches Windows Server, Linux, VMware vSphere, Proxmox, Security+, and Microsoft Azure (AZ-900). Read the founder story.

"OA" stands for Outcomes Assessment. "Atlas" is the navigation metaphor: the platform charts how courses align to programs to institutional outcomes, the same way an atlas charts geography. The full company name is AtlasOA, LLC, a Missouri limited liability company headquartered in Clayton.

No. There are several unrelated products that use "Atlas" or "ATLAS" in their names: the University of Kansas's ATLAS, Watermark's "Atlas" feature inside Outcomes Assessment Projects, OnAtlas / AssessPrep, and the Arkansas ATLAS Portal for K-12. AtlasOA is a separate, independent product built by Ashley Reddick and AtlasOA, LLC. We are not affiliated with any of those.

AtlasOA is built by a practicing instructor and is priced for technical and community colleges. Watermark is enterprise software with quote-only pricing typically aimed at large four-year institutions. AtlasOA, LLC also publishes Atlas K-12, a separate K-12 SEL/MTSS program. See the full AtlasOA vs Watermark comparison.

AtlasOA is self-hostable, transparently priced, and faster to set up. Nuventive's reporting library is broader. See the full comparison.

AtlasOA replaces the Outcomes / Compliance Assist piece. Anthology's broader suite (Engage, Beacon, Reach, Lifecycle) is not in scope for AtlasOA. Full comparison.

Yes. AtlasOA accepts CSV imports of outcomes, courses, programs, alignments, and historical assessment data. Migrations typically take one to three weeks depending on data volume. A weekend remote install with screen-share debugging is available as an optional add-on.

Starter $3,500 per year, Premium $8,500 per year, Enterprise $12,500 per year. The Founder Partner program is closed; existing Founder Partners keep their locked-in pricing for the life of their license. See the pricing page for what is included in each tier.

No. AtlasOA pricing is a flat annual fee per institution. There is no per-student bill that grows with enrollment.

Founder Partners are the early institutions that adopted AtlasOA while the Founder Partner program was open. The program is now closed. Existing Founder Partners keep their locked-in pricing and benefits for the life of their license, including white-glove onboarding and direct access to Ashley for feature requests.

All tiers include SLO tracking, curriculum mapping, accreditation evidence collection, rubric scoring, and the REST API. Premium adds advanced reporting and Jenzabar integration. Atlas K-12 is a separate product, licensed separately. Enterprise adds multi-campus support, custom SIS integration, and priority support. See the full breakdown.

Yes. AtlasOA supports evidence collection workflows for all six U.S. regional accreditors: HLC (Higher Learning Commission), SACSCOC (Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges), MSCHE (Middle States Commission on Higher Education), NWCCU (Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities), WSCUC (WASC Senior College and University Commission), and ACCJC (Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges).

AtlasOA supports outcome-to-criterion mapping and rubric scoring at the level most specialized accreditors require. For ABET-heavy engineering and technology programs, see the AtlasOA vs AEFIS comparison. Closing-the-loop narrative templates for ABET, AACSB, CAEP, ACEN, and CCNE are included.

AtlasOA prompts faculty and program leads at the end of each assessment cycle to: (1) record what they learned from the data, (2) document the change they will make next cycle, (3) link that change to a measurable outcome, and (4) carry that link forward into next cycle's report. Closing-the-loop documentation is automatically pulled into the accreditation evidence package.

Yes. AtlasOA includes outcome achievement reports, distribution reports, gap analysis, drilldown into individual outcomes, and exportable Excel, Word, and ZIP evidence packages suitable for trustees and system-office reporting.

Atlas K-12 is a separate program from AtlasOA. Both are published by AtlasOA, LLC. It is a standalone K-12 student support platform, not a module or stripped-down version of AtlasOA. It provides SEL screening, MTSS tier tracking, and Care Team workflows, and includes Compass, a local AI assistant that runs on hardware the district owns and never calls cloud AI services. Atlas K-12 replicates the core functionality of Panorama Education's Student Success platform. Learn more.

Atlas K-12 includes a local AI assistant that runs entirely on the district's hardware and never calls cloud AI services. Panorama Student Success is hosted SaaS. Atlas K-12 is also priced for districts that cannot afford Panorama's enterprise contract. See the full Atlas K-12 vs Panorama comparison.

Compass is the local AI assistant inside Atlas K-12. It runs entirely on a school district's own hardware and never calls out to any outside AI service. Today, Compass runs an open-source model (Lite, Standard, or Pro tier depending on RAM available). Those models will be replaced by our own AI model, built only for Atlas K-12 and trained specifically for K-12 education. Instead of a general-purpose model that knows a little about everything, it is built to know K-12 student support and the Atlas K-12 system. It can also see and reference the strategies and data each district adds, without ever being trained on that data. Compass is shaped by the district's curated 788-technique intervention catalog from IES, WWC, PBIS, CASEL, and NCII.

Yes. We're building a model of our own, trained specifically for K-12 education, to power the next version of Compass. It will run locally like today's Compass, with no cloud AI calls, and ship only after testing and educator review.

AtlasOA is built on Python, Flask, and SQLite. It is designed to run on commodity Windows hardware and is self-hostable so institutions retain data residency.

Yes. AtlasOA can pull grades and enrollment data directly from Jenzabar's SQL Server (STUDENT_CRS_HIST, NAME_MASTER, SECTION_MASTER tables) for institutions running Jenzabar J1. This connector is in beta: tested against a simulated database, not yet against a live campus system. See the integration matrix.

AtlasOA includes adapters for Jenzabar (J1, EX, and CX), Canvas, Blackboard, and Moodle, plus CSV and Excel imports. Adapters for other systems are available as a one-time custom integration. See the integration matrix for each adapter's status.

Yes. AtlasOA's REST API returns courses, outcomes, achievement, and students as JSON with per-user tokens; everything else is available through exports or the SQLite database file.

Yes. AtlasOA is designed for self-hosting on commodity Windows hardware. A typical small institution runs the entire stack on one server.

No software is FERPA-certified; FERPA compliance depends on how an institution uses its systems. AtlasOA is designed to support your FERPA obligations: it runs on your servers, so student data stays inside your network unless you configure an integration, and it provides role-based access and a tamper-evident audit log. See Privacy, FERPA, and COPPA.

On the institution's own hardware by default. AtlasOA is self-hostable, so the database (SQLite, built in; a PostgreSQL option is on the roadmap) runs inside your institution's network.

No outbound calls are required for normal operation. The Atlas K-12 Compass AI assistant explicitly does not call any external service. License keys are verified on your server, with no outbound check. Optional outbound traffic is limited to the email server, backup destination, and LMS or SIS integrations you opt into. See the network reference.

AtlasOA backs up its database automatically before every import and on an optional schedule, keeping the newest 50 by default. Uploaded files are copied only by the offsite backup option, so include the data folder in your institution's own nightly backups. See Backup and recovery.

AtlasOA is designed for institutions to be running within days, not months. There is no required consultant engagement. A Saturday or Sunday remote install with screen-share debugging is available for institutions that want a hand.

Email support is included on all tiers. Premium and Enterprise add priority response and a quarterly check-in. Existing Founder Partners have direct access to Ashley.

The public roadmap lives on the roadmap page, and the changelog lists released changes by date.

No. The Founder Partner program is closed, and existing Founder Partners keep their locked-in pricing and benefits for the life of their license. If you want to evaluate AtlasOA at standard pricing, email Ashley with your institution name, accreditor, and approximate enrollment. We will send the 30-day evaluation package (installer, license key, and Evaluation Guide) so your team can test it directly. See how the evaluation works.