Hall Pass Alternatives
Published by Asan Digital LLC, the makers of EduQueue. EduQueue is not a hall-pass app. SmartPass, Raptor, Securly, e-hallpass, Minga and 5-Star Students are trademarks of their owners; we compare, we don’t affiliate.

Integration

Either/or is a false choice

A hall-pass tool and a campus check-in tool record different movements and write to different places. Most schools that run both never notice they are running both, which is how it should be. This page shows where the seam is and describes the PowerSchool write-back without marketing language.

Who records what

MovementRecorded byUnitEnds up in
Room to restroom and backHall-pass toolMinutes out; destinationThe pass tool’s reports; sometimes an SIS export5
Room to nurse / office / counsellorHall-pass toolMinutes; who signed backSame
Arriving late at the front doorEduQueue “Late to School” eventAttendance code by time windowPowerSchool attendance
Leaving early / dismissalEduQueue event (sequential outcomes)Check-in and check-out timesDaily report; attendance where coded
Between two buildings (shared campus)EduQueue building exchangeOut of A, into B, per locationExchange report; system close-out
A parent or contractor at the doorEduQueue visitor managementScreened check-in, badgeVisit log

The first two rows belong to whichever pass tool you choose; nothing on this site argues you should replace it with us, because we do not do those rows. The remaining rows are where EduQueue runs, and where a pass tool typically has a lighter feature (SmartPass missed-class-time on Pro, Securly and Minga tardy modules)5,11,14 that does not carry the district’s attendance code to the SIS as far as any of them has published.

The PowerSchool write-back, plainly

Three things are true, and we would rather you heard them from us than discovered them:

  1. The roster comes from PowerSchool nightly. Students, grades, homerooms and photos are synced through a PowerSchool plugin the district installs. This is live at Union City and has been for years.
  2. The attendance code is the district’s own. Each late-arrival outcome carries a short code typed in by the district’s PowerSchool admin — the same value that appears in PowerSchool’s attendance-code table. There is no mapping layer for anyone to maintain; there is only validation that the code exists.
  3. Posting the code back is in transition. Today the district receives a nightly attendance file. A direct write-back through an updated PowerSchool plugin (one that has write access, which the earlier plugin never had) was built in August 2026 and is being installed with the district’s PowerSchool administrator. The open decision on their side is whether the code lands as daily attendance or meeting attendance; a late-arrival scan has no natural period, and that choice belongs to the district, not to us.

Ask us before assuming a specific integration. If your SIS is Genesis, Infinite Campus, Skyward, Aeries or Synergy, we have not written a connector for it and will not pretend otherwise. A file export is possible for any of them; a direct write-back is a scoping conversation. Tell us the SIS in the demo form and we will answer in the reply, not in a follow-up call.

Running both: the practical seams

If you are choosing only one

Then choose by the problem. Corridor: a pass tool, and the comparison says which. Door: a kiosk that assigns the code, and the playbook shows it. If the budget covers exactly one, our honest view is that the door produces the record the state, the SIS and the early-warning model actually consume — but that is our product talking, and you should weigh it as such.

Sources (all fetched 4 September 2026)

  1. Raptor Technologies, “Raptor Technologies Acquires SmartPass”, 10 December 2024: SmartPass is “a digital hall pass + student accountability solution that replaces traditional hall passes”, “supporting over 3,000 K–12 schools nationwide”; “The integration of SmartPass with Raptor’s product portfolio will provide the most comprehensive unified platform for schools to manage daily operations”. No pricing or bundling statement. raptortech.com
  2. EdWeek Market Brief, “K-12 Dealmaking: Raptor Acquires SmartPass; zSpace Raises $10.8M in IPO”, 12 December 2024: terms not disclosed; SmartPass previously raised seed funding from Reach Capital and Edovate Capital; Raptor backed by Thoma Bravo and JMI Equity; follows Raptor’s April 2023 purchase of SchoolPass. marketbrief.edweek.org
  3. smartpass.app home page: product now styled “Raptor SmartPass”, “Now a Raptor Technologies Company”; “Smarter Movement for 2 million+ Educators and Students”; “Manage Virtual Queues, Room Capacities, and Pass Limits”; iOS app with kiosk mode; COPPA and SDPC badges; “All SmartPass products are compliant with data protection regulations and standards”. smartpass.app
  4. smartpass.app/hall-pass: “Limit the number of passes students can have per day, week or term”; “Prevent 2+ students from being in the hallways at the same time. They are automatically blocked and notifications are sent to teachers”; kiosk at the main office or in classrooms; rostering via Clever, ClassLink, Google, or CSV; tiers named Lite, Standard, Pro; no dollar amounts. smartpass.app/hall-pass
  5. Raptor, “SmartPass Digital Hall Pass System” product page: plan matrix with “Kiosk Mode” and “Passes Need Approval” at Standard and above, “Parent Accounts”, “Missed Class Time Tracking”, “Emergency Mode” and “AI-powered Detected Encounters” at Pro; “Attendance can be taken and edited directly within activities, then exported to the SIS”; presented within Raptor’s “Campus Movement” suite alongside visitor and dismissal products. raptortech.com
  6. smartpass.app/pricing is a demo-request form with no prices, tiers or terms. smartpass.app/pricing
  7. The Frederick News-Post, “Schools can purchase digital hall pass system starting in July”, 14 May 2025 (republished by Raptor): Frederick County Public Schools, MD, awarded Raptor a SmartPass contract at $3.15 per student per year, July 2025 through June 2028 with one optional two-year extension, on a 3–2 board vote. raptortech.com (reprint)
  8. Gothamist, Jessica Gould, “New digital hall passes track bathroom breaks, gather data in NYC schools”, 24 March 2026: NYC education department spent $368,000 on SmartPass contracts in 2025 and $120,000 the year before; 167 schools; student Shokhjakhon Samiev: “It’s taken micromanaging students to a whole other level”; NYCLU’s Johanna Miller: “It’s just creepy”; DOE’s Onika Richards: “all approved tools must meet established privacy and security standards”; ~1,400-signature petition for an AI moratorium. gothamist.com
  9. smartpass.app/privacy returns HTTP 301 to raptortech.com/privacy-policy/ (last updated July 2026), which states it “does not apply to any information we collect pursuant to agreements to provide services to our customers, including schools” and refers to a separate services privacy policy we could not reach at a public URL. A student-data retention period for SmartPass is therefore not published where we could find it. raptortech.com/privacy-policy
  10. eduspiresolutions.org/e-hallpass/ returns HTTP 301 to securly.com/pass. Securly’s blog announced that Securly and Eduspire (e-hallpass, FlexTime Manager) had “joined forces”, quoting Securly CEO Bharath Madhusudan. blog.securly.com
  11. Securly Pass product page: “Live Dashboard”, “Student Pass Limits”, “Contact Control”, “Auto-Pass”, “Appointment Pass”, “Location Pass Limits”, “Pass Kiosk”, “Proxy Pass”, “Tardy Management”; “All data in Securly Pass is encrypted and protected using industry standard security practices”; data collected is names, school emails, optionally ID number and grade. No integrations or prices named on the page. securly.com/pass
  12. Securly Privacy Policy, effective 19 January 2026: Student Information deleted “when it is no longer needed for the purpose for which it was collected and in any case, within thirty (30) days after the School’s agreement with us ends”; “Securly does not: Sell Student Information; Build Student profiles for commercial purposes; or Use Student Information for advertising”; acts as a FERPA “school official”. securly.com/privacy
  13. securly.com/pricing is a demo-request page with no prices; sales contact only. securly.com/pricing
  14. Minga, “Digital Hall Pass”: “Daily Hall Pass Limits: Prevent ‘frequent flyers’ by capping the number of passes per student”; restroom-specific limit example “3 per day”; “Kiosk Mode”; “Weekly Parent Summaries: Parents get a weekly email summary of their child’s behavior and missed class time”; “Automated Meetup Blocking”; “built-in tardy management”; rostering from the SIS via “MingaSync”; tiers Basic, Plus, Premium, prices on request. minga.io/digital-hall-pass; scale claim “over 2,500+ Schools and 750 Districts” from minga.io.
  15. 5-Star Students, Pricing: per-school annual subscription including hall passes; secondary schools by enrolment — under 300 students $2,300 start-up / $1,400 renewal; 300–1,000 $2,850 / $1,850; 1,001–2,500 $3,350 / $2,250; 2,501–5,000 $3,850 / $2,650; student-communications add-on $250–$1,000; on-site training $2,500/day. 5starstudents.com/Pricing; hall pass and barcode-scan features from 5starstudents.com.
  16. Hallwise (a competing hall-pass vendor) publishes a comparison page claiming SmartPass at “$2.50–$5 per student” and e-hallpass at “$3–$5 per student … plus $1,000 one-time setup”, and states “Neither vendor publishes a price list; both quote on request.” Competitor-authored; we cite it for the range and the quote-only point only, and the one primary figure we can verify is note 7. hallwise.com/compare
  17. Raptor blog, “Student Visibility Isn’t Surveillance. It’s Safety & Accountability.”, 1 May 2026: “Contrary to popular belief, digital hall passes aren’t designed to track students in real time. There’s no live location monitoring.” raptortech.com
  18. Securly blog, “3 Digital Hall Pass Myths Debunked”, March 2024: “Securly Pass is not a tracking and surveillance device. It does not use GPS … It only knows the student’s intended destination.”; principal quoted that hallway numbers “gone down by 30-40%”. blog.securly.com
  19. ACLU, press release for “Digital Dystopia: The Danger in Buying What the EdTech Surveillance Industry is Selling”, 3 October 2023: 87% of 502 surveyed students aged 14–18 report surveillance technology at school; 26% concerned about data privacy; K-12 spending on security products estimated at $3.1 billion in 2021. aclu.org; coverage with the 32% “always feel like I’m being watched” and 40% “safe” figures: K-12 Dive, Anna Merod, 6 October 2023, k12dive.com.
  20. U.S. Department of Education, “Chronic Absenteeism”: “typically defined as missing at least 10 percent of school days, or approximately 18 days in a year, for any reason, excused or unexcused”; national rate about 31% in 2021–22 and 28% in 2022–23. ed.gov
  21. Nat Malkus and Sam Hollon, “Need Not Be a Surprise: Early-Warning Systems for Chronic Absenteeism”, American Enterprise Institute, 14 October 2025 (updated 27 May 2026): models built on routinely collected absence counts predict chronic absence at roughly 90% accuracy; “Waiting to intervene until midway through the year will certainly make it clearer which students are on track to become chronically absent, but by only a few points of accuracy.” The report models absence counts, not tardies. aei.org

See the late-arrival kiosk in 15 minutes

A screen-share of the tardy kiosk as Union City runs it: scan, outcome by time window, the attendance code, the report. Tell us your SIS so we can say plainly what posts back and what does not.

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