Outschool

I got on the platform during covid, and was doing great. I was set to have 310 new students beginning my flex classes this fall. I setup a referral group on FB recommending the platform, and I recommended 258 teachers. We are suppose to get $200 for each teacher referred. Then all of a sudden they closed my acct. I lost full access to all of my curriculum I was using for flex classes, and all of my classes were canceled. I lost 310 students! I tried to message support but it was non existant. That occurred on August 17. Now on 9/13 they wrote back and told me they do not have to honor the teacher referral program since I no longer have an acct. Wow! So the $51,800 referral they were suppose to pay is now gone. But all of my students are lost. Beware everyone! This platform is very shady. Google you will see they are doing this to many teachers.

I found out on Sept 1 that they were still registering families in my classes. I created another email address and logged on, and was able to register for my class and pay. So they are accepting payments for classes when I am no longer able to get on the platform. After 24 hours I asked for a refund, they said I could only get a pro rated refund, so then I realized they are keeping my classes and others on the platform to get a week or two out of each class in hopes the parents do not realize the class is unmanned for awhile. Very wrong on so many ways. See full video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAzb7grjmyM where I click my past links and I am able to show you how I can still register and pay.

My 8 year old daughter attended this class, I sat right beside her to ensure that she would pay attention. However, before the class even started, the teacher said she saw another child and kept asking who else was attending the class. I explained again and again that I was the mother and there was no other child attending, she still questioned me for quite a while, during the whole time, her tone was harsh, as if yelling at a little kid, which made me very uncomfortable. Finally the teacher said that maybe she mistakenly saw someone, and moved on. A few days later, I received an email from outschool, indicated that I was reported for letting multiple children attended the class! It writes"... There is no way to retroactively pay for your other learner who attended this class but please make sure that this doesn't happen again..." To my understanding, lots of classes are recorded, I would strongly suggest outschool to review the recording and show me the evidence that there is more than one kid attended that class!

Trying to figure out why the teacher insisted on another child attending the class, I realized that my another younger kid, she got curious and stopped by her sister briefly to watch what she was doing, but then she ran upstairs to play with her toys. When the teacher questioned me, my younger kid was already gone before I even sat down, I didn't think of it. My another daughter is only 6 year old, she has very different interest with my 8 year old, she does not like drawing, even if she has to draw, she likes cute animal doodles much more than 3D cityscape, she has absolute no interest in this particular class, and again, the FACT IS: she Did Not, and she has NO interest in sneaking in the class!

My advice to the teacher: Please do not accuse and report people just based on your assumption. You are not a detective!
My advice to outschool: you don't send out some nasty email to other people just based on one side of the story -- Even a judger will have to investigate, collect evidences, and listen to both sides of stories before any condemnation! Especially we are also your client, who pays for your service and expect customer satisfaction.

Outschool demands cameras to be used in order for kids to participate on the platform. The platform is used by students in various countries. Online privacy matters and instances of online piracy is a high risk, as it is inevitable that oversight is not strict in certain countries to combat online privacy issues or online piracy. There's really no control over what people do with your child's image in the recorded class, especially if the players are out of the country. As an alternative to having children recorded, Outschool places families in another risk. If the child doesn't feel comfortable having a camera on to participate in paid classes, Outschool then demands a photo of the child and parent together. There is no public policy on what Outschool can or can't do with your child's image after they demand the photo to be transmitted non-encrypted electronically to their office. Even larger, more established fortune 500 companies with extensive security have been targets of ID theft. Outschool should eliminate the mandate for a parent to send a child's photo electronically non encrypted and/or they should reasonably create photo storage in a more updated, safe manner. A transparent public policy on what is done with a child's image is a basic necessity for parents to view if children not wanting to be on camera are forced to send Outschool photos. Most importantly, parents need to be aware that kids may leave the camera and audio on after a class is over. An Outschool teacher recorded a child's private home and audio well after the class time was over. There is no agreement nor allowance for some stranger to look into your home or listen to private conversation. There's no public policy made available to parents on Outschool to prevent teachers from doing so in the future. Experts know the dangers of recording any person, especially a child, in the privacy of their own home without consent. Talk about a nightmare once discovered. Given the complete lack of judgement for this teacher just for that, you already know for certain there are other problems with them. As others have depicted, teacher quality can vary. This specific teacher's example clearly shows her broad poor judgement, antiquated entitlement and manipulative behavior. An older teacher recording someone else's home and video interacting without that parents permission using Outschool as a platform shows a seriously tainted lens and a complete lack of self awareness.
Outschool can't have complicated camera mandates then allow a teacher to abuse a paying clients' privacy. Outschool can't just make for-profit decisions, they have to follow broader privacy regulations (sometimes varying by state), as well.