New Gmail Interface in Education

I have been away a while from the blog, but that doesn't mean I haven't been using some of the newly available tools.  Today I would like to give a hearty thumbs up to the new Gmail interface.  I have been using it since it was first available for our edu domain and am very pleased so far.

There are a slew of new features, but I want to focus on a few that will help busy school staff and students be more efficient.

First of all, you have to turn on the new features by visiting your Gear in Gmail and opting into the new interface.  If you don't see this option as the first listed, you will have to ask your domain administrator to turn this feature on for your domain.  It is well worth it.

By far my two favorite features are the smart reply messages you can use when replying to emails and the ability to snooze an email so that it comes to your inbox when you might want to look/work on that item.

But there are a couple other enhancements that really save me time.  The sidebar on the right with add-ons is great.  I now have my Calendar, Keep, Tasks, Zoom meetings, and Pod.  Pod is a cool free add-on that looks at the messages in your inbox and lets you create events from the content of emails, find free time, suggest 1:1 meeting times, and other great features without leaving your Gmail interface.

Overall I am appreciating the hover buttons to delete, archive, read, and snooze mails.  With an improved overall look and feel I can say that I am happy with it and will now roll it out to all the staff in our district as our standard.