Privacy Policy

Last updated: February 22, 2026

TinkerSchool is built for kids, so protecting your child's privacy is our highest priority. This policy is written in plain language so you know exactly what we collect, why, and how to control it.

Children's Privacy & COPPA Compliance

TinkerSchool is designed for children ages 5-12 and complies with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). We never collect personal information from children under 13 without verifiable parental consent.

Operator:

TinkerSchool, Inc.

7736 Winter Snow Ct, Newcastle, CA 95658

Phone: (424) 234-6720

Email: privacy@tinkerschool.ai

A parent or legal guardian must create and manage all accounts. During account setup, parents must affirmatively consent to data collection by checking a consent box acknowledging this privacy policy. We record the consent timestamp and the consenting IP address. A confirmation email is sent to the parent's registered email address summarizing what data is collected and how to exercise parental rights.

You may refuse consent at any time. If you do not consent or later withdraw consent, you may request deletion of all data collected from your child by emailing privacy@tinkerschool.ai or by using the Delete Account feature in the parent dashboard. Your child's ability to use the platform is not conditioned on providing more data than is reasonably necessary for the educational activities.

What We Collect

We collect only what is necessary to provide a personalized learning experience. Here is the complete list:

Child's first name

So Chip (our AI tutor) can address your child by name

Grade level

To match lesson difficulty to your child's age

Avatar choice

A fun profile icon your child picks during setup

Learning progress

Completed lessons, quiz scores, and skill levels so we can personalize their learning path

AI chat conversations

Conversations with Chip are logged so parents can review them and so Chip can remember context

Projects created

Code blocks and projects your child builds in the workshop

Learning profile

Learning style preferences, interests, and skill proficiency levels to personalize Chip's tutoring

Voice session metadata

When using Chip's voice mode, we store session duration and timestamps (not audio recordings)

IP address at signup

Recorded once during account creation for COPPA consent verification

What we do NOT collect from children:

Email addresses, phone numbers, or physical addresses
Photos or videos
Stored audio recordings (voice audio is streamed to Hume AI in real-time for voice tutoring but is not recorded or stored by TinkerSchool)
Location data or device identifiers
Browsing history or tracking cookies

How We Use Your Data

All data collected is used exclusively for educational personalization. Specifically:

Adapting lesson content and difficulty to your child's level
Powering Chip's personalized tutoring conversations
Tracking learning progress and awarding achievement badges
Providing parents with learning reports in the parent dashboard

We never use your child's data for advertising, profiling, or any purpose unrelated to their education.

Who Can Access Your Data

Your family's data is strictly scoped. Here is who can see what:

Parents / Guardians

Full access to all child data, chat history, progress reports, and projects within your family

Your child

Their own progress, projects, and conversations only

Other families

Nothing. All data is family-scoped and isolated through row-level security policies

Third-Party Services

We use a small number of trusted services to run TinkerSchool. We do not sell or share your child's personal data with anyone.

Clerk

-- Authentication (parent accounts)

Parent email and login credentials only. Child profiles use a PIN under the parent's account with no personal data shared.

Supabase

-- Database hosting

All learning data, with row-level security ensuring family isolation. Hosted on secure, SOC 2 compliant infrastructure.

Anthropic (Claude)

-- AI tutoring (authenticated users)

Each conversation sends the child's first name, age, grade level, current subject, lesson context, learning profile (learning style and interests), skill proficiency levels, recent lesson titles, and the chat message to generate Chip's responses. No email, address, photo, or other identifying information is included. Per Anthropic's commercial API data usage policy, conversations sent through their API are not used to train AI models. Anthropic retains API inputs for up to 30 days for safety monitoring, then deletes them.

OpenAI

-- AI demo on landing page (unauthenticated)

The anonymous Try Chip demo on the landing page uses OpenAI to generate responses. Messages are not persisted and no account data is sent. The demo does not ask for or store any personal information. Per OpenAI's API data usage policy, data sent through their API is not used to train models.

Hume AI

-- Voice tutoring (requires parental voice consent)

Voice audio is streamed in real-time from your child's microphone to generate Chip's spoken responses. Voice mode requires a separate parental consent step before first use. TinkerSchool does not store audio recordings -- only session duration and timestamps are stored. Hume AI processes voice data to generate speech and does not use it for model training. See Hume AI's privacy policy at hume.ai/privacy for full details on their data handling.

Stripe

-- Payment processing

Processes parent subscription payments. Stripe receives parent billing information (name, email, payment method) but never receives any child data. Stripe is PCI DSS Level 1 compliant.

Vercel

-- Application hosting and analytics

Hosts the application. Vercel Analytics and Speed Insights collect anonymous page view metrics and Web Vitals performance data. These analytics scripts are only loaded on public marketing pages and the parent dashboard -- they are never loaded on kid-facing authenticated pages. Standard web server logs include IP addresses and request metadata. No personal child data is stored by Vercel.

Cloudflare

-- Web analytics

Collects anonymous, aggregated page view statistics on public marketing pages and the parent dashboard only. Cloudflare analytics scripts are never loaded on kid-facing authenticated pages. No cookies are set and no personal data is collected. Used to understand overall site traffic.

Upstash

-- Rate limiting

Stores anonymous rate limit counters (keyed by parent account ID) to prevent AI chat abuse. No child data or conversation content is sent to Upstash.

Anonymous Demo (Landing Page)

The "Try Chip" demo on our landing page is fully anonymous. It does not require an account, does not set tracking cookies, and does not collect or store any personal information. Messages typed into the demo are sent to OpenAI to generate responses and are not persisted by TinkerSchool. The demo reminds visitors not to share personal information such as their name or school.

Data Retention

Your data is kept for as long as your account is active.
If you delete your account, all associated data (profiles, progress, chat history, projects) is permanently deleted within 30 days.
You can request data deletion at any time without deleting your account by contacting us.

Your Rights as a Parent

Under COPPA and applicable privacy laws, you have the right to:

Review your child's data -- view all collected information through the parent dashboard
Request deletion -- ask us to delete any or all of your child's data at any time
Revoke consent -- withdraw permission for data collection, which will deactivate your child's profile
Export your child's data -- download all collected information as a JSON file from the parent dashboard settings
Data portability -- request a copy of your child's data in a machine-readable format

To exercise any of these rights, email us at privacy@tinkerschool.ai. We will respond within 30 days.

How We Protect Your Data

All data is encrypted in transit (TLS) and at rest
Database access is enforced through row-level security policies, so each family can only see their own data
Authentication is handled by Clerk, a SOC 2 compliant auth provider
AI conversations are rate-limited to prevent misuse and all conversations are available for parent review
The platform is open source, so our code and security practices can be audited by anyone

Changes to This Policy

If we make material changes to this privacy policy, we will notify parents via email before the changes take effect. Minor clarifications or formatting updates will be reflected by updating the "Last updated" date at the top of this page.

If you have questions about this privacy policy, want to exercise your parental rights, or need to request data deletion, contact the operator:

TinkerSchool, Inc.

Email: privacy@tinkerschool.ai

Website: tinkerschool.ai

Address: TinkerSchool, Inc., 7736 Winter Snow Ct, Newcastle, CA 95658

Phone: (424) 234-6720

We aim to respond to all privacy inquiries within 30 days. If you believe we have collected personal information from your child without proper consent, please contact us immediately and we will promptly investigate and delete the data if appropriate.