Case study: National University of Córdoba

Founded in 1613, the National University of Córdoba is the second largest university in Argentina, with tuition-free enrollment for all. The university’s Faculty of Mathematics, Astronomy, Physics and Computing (FAMAF) teaches classes to over 5000 undergraduates from all over the country.

“Zulip is a key piece of how we run classes in our department,” says Nicolás Wolovick, a professor at FAMAF and director of the computer science career track. “If we didn’t have Zulip, I really don’t know how we’d manage it.”

Sponsored hosting for a modern team chat app

For a while, FAMAF used Moodle’s course management software to communicate with students, but “it was a pain,” Nicolás recalls. The department tried moving to Slack. However, without a software budget, the message history limit on Slack’s free plan was a major frustration.

In search of an alternative, a faculty member reached out to request a sponsored Zulip Cloud Standard plan. With the request approved the very next day, the department moved over to Zulip starting starting in Fall 2020.

Looking back, being pushed off Slack by its search history limit ended up being for the best: “I think Zulip is a great tool, much better than Slack,” says Miguel Pagano, professor at FAMAF.

“I think Zulip is a great tool, much better than Slack.”

— Miguel Pagano, professor at FAMAF of the National University of Córdoba

Zulip becomes a knowledge base

Zulip has become part of the core flow of how faculty at FAMAF run their classes. Instructors create channels for the classes they teach each semester. For lab classes, instructors make private channels for communication with each project group. “I use pinned channels to focus on the two subjects I’m teaching right now,” Nicolás notes.

Discussions from prior semesters are available for easy reference, so instructors can simply point students to past conversations for answers to their questions. “Zulip acts as a knowledge database of what we did in each subject,” Nicolás explains. “The search is perfect.”

“We can find messages from five years ago — it’s very convenient.”

— Miguel Pagano, professor at FAMAF of the National University of Córdoba

A cross-generational app for instructors and students

Many members of the faculty prefer familiar tools, and sometimes find the UI of apps like Discord overwhelming. So it matters that Zulip has a clean interface, with channels and conversations inside channels clearly presented. There are also some friendly touches: “I love using Markdown for message formatting, and that you can copy-paste formatted text, and it translates accurately,” Nicolás notes.

“The UI is spartan, simple, clear — I like that. It reminds me of what Google used to be.”

— Nicolás Wolovick, professor at FAMAF of the National University of Córdoba

And while students hardly use email, Nicolás and other faculty appreciate being able to send messages to Zulip by replying to email notifications.

At the same time, Zulip offers fun features for the students. “We have a whole subculture of custom emoji,” Nicolás says. “Students love to use them to customize the space and express themselves.”

Still, the overall vibe is professional, and moderation has never been an issue. “I’ve never had to ban anyone or even delete a message,” Nicolás says. Students keep their Zulip account after graduation, which provides a way for faculty and alumni to stay connected.

Learn more about Zulip for Education, and how Zulip is being used at the Technical University of Munich and the University of California San Diego. You can also check out our guides on using Zulip for conferences and research!