Just a technical/infrastructure note that might be useful:
On Thu, Jul 10, 2014 at 12:26 PM, Jennifer Gristock <gristock@me.com> wrote:
But I see that this is being replaced by the Campaigns extension, I wonder what might be most appropriate there.
Yes, Editor Campaigns is ultimately slated to replace the Education Extension, but this will happen gradually over the next year (or so, depending on engineering resources, etc.). Editor Campaigns will likely have its initial release in the coming weeks/months, and as more functionality is added to it, it will start to supersede functions that the Education Extension currently provides (chunk by chunk, not in one fell swoop).
One of the goals of Editor Campaigns is to have a more flexible arrangement so you wouldn't have to always set up a 'Class,' but rather you could set up a 'Research' perhaps. Same goes for workshops and edit-a-thons, etc. It will also integrate with Wikimetrics to make running reports on your user cohorts a breeze :)
In short, I'd say if you want something that works today for managing/tracking a cohort of users on-wiki, go with the Education Extension on your project's wiki; and keep in the loop with any developments by signing up here :)