Cost to students?
Until July 2026, Perusall was free to use, however it now has a flexible pricing model.
When you set it up for your class, you can select the lowest cost of $5 per student, per semester.
It's free to students if you assign one textbook for them to purchase from the Perusall library containing 1.4 million titles at standard prices.
If you, as instructor, are using Perusall for the first time, it'll be free to students for that semester.
There's a hardship waiver available for students who need it.
Research shows that when students do their pre-class readings, and when they have the opportunity to discuss the material, it increases their understanding of the concepts, inspires them to participate more in class, and ultimately helps them perform better on exams (Miller, et al. 2018).
Teaching ideas for Perusall
- Upload a variety of materials—PDFs, Word documents, Excel files, videos, images, ePub ebooks, and some websites—and assign your students to read, annotate, and discuss the materials with each other.
- To get students started with Perusall, upload your syllabus and ask students to annotate it with questions, comments on the topics that they’re most interested in, or suggested additional readings. Ask them to respond to one another’s remarks, answering questions if possible.
- You can create a special folder into which students can upload their own writings and have their peers give them feedback.
- Before students start their own writing assignment, you can upload sample work from a past student (with their name redacted) and ask students to evaluate it based on the rubric you’ll use for their version of that assignment.
- Upload a captioned video your lecture and ask students to post insights, connections to the reading, or questions and ask them to answer each others’ questions.
How to Begin using Perusall
UVM has connected the Perusall tool to work and sync with Brightspace. This link MUST be initiated within a Brightspace course (not on the Perusall website directly). This platform is secure, and FERPA compliant.
Detailed instructions are on the UVM Knowledge Base.
Perusall has an extensive knowledge base, too, and offers workshops online.
References
Miller, K., Lukoff, B., King, G., and Mazur, E. (2018.) Use of a social annotation platform for pre-class reading assignments in a flipped introductory physics class. Frontiers in Education, 3(8).