Questions parents ask before they start
What OHM School covers, how progress is judged, what it collects about a child, and what it costs. If something here is out of date, it is a bug — tell us.
- 10
- General questions
- 13
- Guardian and billing questions
- Nothing aspirational
- Every answer is true today
The basics, in plain words.
What the platform is, who built it, what it covers and what it costs — the questions that come before signing up, and the ones people ask when they are still comparing options.
Who founded OHM School?
OHM School was founded by Sydney Thackray, Jack Jay, M Achyuth, and Hakkan Shah. Sydney Thackray and Jack Jay brought the original idea and mentor the team, and hold their own roles at Persist. M Achyuth and Hakkan Shah build the platform and curriculum directly. OHM School is built and operated under Persist and Vital Ventures.
Is OHM School part of a larger company?
Yes. OHM School is built and operated under Persist and Vital Ventures. Persist is where Sydney Thackray and Jack Jay, two of the four co-founders, hold their own roles. Persist (https://www.persist.org/); Vital Ventures (https://www.vitalv.org/).
What grades does OHM School cover?
Kindergarten through Grade 12. Browse the curriculum pages without an account to see the current published grades, subjects, units and lesson outlines.
Is the curriculum aligned to state standards?
Every lesson is mapped to California academic standards (AP Calculus AB follows the College Board's AP course framework). Educator review of those mappings is not finished, so read them as a guide to what a lesson covers, not as a certification. Each subject page lists the units and lessons a student works through, so the coverage can be checked before signing up rather than taken on trust.
How much does OHM School cost?
Every student can start free: the curriculum, lessons, assessments and progress reports, with 10 Ollie tutor messages and one new Explore course a month. OHM Pro ($15 a month) and OHM Pro+ ($25 a month) add more tutor messages, course credits and homework photo help, and yearly billing gives two months free. Adults who only want the AI Course Creator can try one course free, then buy credit packs from $5. Full details are on the pricing page.
Does my child have to be homeschooled to use it?
No. Families use it as a supplement alongside school, and others build a fuller plan around it. OHM School is a learning platform rather than an accredited school, so legal schooling requirements still depend on where you live.
Can learners work together on OHM?
Yes. A guardian can create a Learning Circle for learners already linked to their account, share assignments, review submissions, and leave feedback. It is family-controlled group learning, not an open chat room or public learner network.
What does mastery-based progress actually mean here?
Progress is recorded as mastery of specific concepts rather than as lessons ticked off. A lesson counts when the work shows the idea was understood, and the next lesson unlocks from that — so a child is not carried past something they have not grasped.
Can more than one guardian follow the same child?
Yes. A child can be linked to more than one guardian, and each link carries its own permissions — viewing progress, sending encouragement, exporting records, managing learning — so a second parent or carer can be given exactly as much access as intended.
How is written work marked?
Practice is worked on an AI whiteboard that reads handwriting and grades the reasoning, not only the final answer. A child who reaches the right answer by the wrong route is picked up, rather than passed.
Your child, your control.
What OHM records about a child, who can see it, how progress is judged, and what you can do about any of it. These answers also appear on the parent page, from this same source, so the two can never drift apart.
What data does OHM collect about my child?
Account basics and learning activity — lessons opened, practice attempted, mastery reached. It is used to adapt lessons and show you progress, and it is never sold or used for targeted ads. The full details live in our privacy policy.
How do I follow progress without hovering over their shoulder?
Open the guardian dashboard whenever you like, or just read the weekly digest when its notification arrives each Monday. Both are written for parents: what was learned, what was mastered, what needs attention.
Is the AI tutor safe for my child to talk to?
Ollie is designed for lesson-focused schoolwork rather than open-ended internet chat. The system provides lesson context, blocks unsafe links, rate-limits use, and has provider fallbacks; no AI system is infallible, so families should still review its guidance.
What happens when my child struggles?
The path slows down instead of pushing forward. OHM offers a different explanation, schedules review, and marks the concept in your dashboard so nothing gets silently skipped.
How much time does OHM expect from a child each day?
OHM does not require a fixed daily duration. A family can use a lesson or two as a supplement, or build a longer plan around its own schedule and local education requirements.
Can we delete our data if we leave?
Yes. You can first download active records and then start verified account deletion from the profile page. Account-linked active data is deleted; a minimized receipt remains for 90 days, and encrypted recovery copies expire under the published backup window.
What you pay for, exactly.
What a tutor message and a course credit are, who pays for a student's plan, and how changing or cancelling works. The prices themselves are on the pricing page.
What counts as a tutor message?
Each question a student sends Ollie, typed or spoken, is one message. Ollie's own automatic hints in a lesson or lab are not counted, and a question Ollie could not answer is given back. Messages refresh every month.
What is a course credit?
Explore and the Course Creator turn any topic into a short course. Starting a new course uses 5 credits, and Ollie writes the whole course for them: every lesson, quiz and practice. Joining a course someone else already made is free. A topic Ollie turns away, or a course that could not be fully written, costs nothing: its credits come back.
Who pays for a student's plan?
Either the student or a parent. A student aged 13 or older can choose and pay for a plan from their own account, after confirming they are 18 or have a parent's permission. A parent or guardian can also choose a child's plan from their family account, and a student can ask a parent for a bigger plan with one button. Children under 13 have accounts a parent creates, so only a parent chooses their plan and they never see a payment form.
Do yearly plans still refresh every month?
Yes. A yearly plan is twelve months of the same monthly allowance for the price of ten, and the messages and credits refresh on the same day each month.
Can I change or cancel a plan?
Any time, from the Plans page. Moving up takes effect at once and charges only the difference. Moving down also takes effect at once, and the unused part of what you paid becomes credit on your next bill. Cancelling keeps the current plan until the end of the period already paid for. Course creator credit packs are one-off purchases with no subscription.
Do course creator credits expire?
No. Credits stay on the account until they are used. A new course creator account starts with one free course; students on the Free plan get one new course every month instead.
How are payments handled?
Payments are processed by Stripe. OHM never sees or stores a full card number; it keeps only what it needs to know which plan an account has. Prices are in US dollars.
Read the whole curriculum before you sign up.
Every grade, subject and unit a child would work through is readable in full without an account — the same structure a student moves through, so you can see exactly what a year holds. Open the curriculum.
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