This policy explains what AcornSmarts does and does not collect. It is written plainly on purpose. If anything here is unclear, email us and we will fix the wording.
1. The short version
- Works with no account. You can use AcornSmarts at home, offline, without signing up. In that mode your child's progress is stored only in your browser on your device — we never receive it.
- Nicknames only. The app is designed so a child is identified by a nickname and an avatar. We do not need or ask for a child's full legal name.
- No advertising, ever. There are no ads, no ad networks, and no advertising identifiers in AcornSmarts.
- No tracking in the app — privacy-lean analytics on this website only. The AcornSmarts app itself sends nothing anywhere: no analytics, no pixels, no cross-site trackers. This marketing website uses Google Analytics solely to count visits and see which pages help families find us — no advertising features, no Facebook pixel, no selling data — and a strict Content-Security-Policy still blocks everything else at the browser level.
- We never sell data. Not your data, not your child's data — not to anyone, for any reason.
Don’t take our word for it — audit it. Open the app, open your browser’s developer tools, and watch the network tab: you’ll see zero calls to analytics, ad networks, or trackers — the app’s Content-Security-Policy blocks them at the browser level. The only data that can’t be leaked, sold, or ransomed is data that was never collected.
2. What we collect — and only if you opt in to cloud sync
Everything above is the default. If a parent chooses to create an account so progress syncs across devices (for example, home and a tablet), we then store the minimum needed to make that work:
- A parent's email + password — to secure the account. Passwords are hashed (bcrypt); we never see or store them in plain text.
- Each child's nickname, avatar, and grade band — to show the right profile. Not a full legal name.
- Learning progress — practice results, mastery scores, stars, streaks, and awards, so growth follows the child to a new device.
Cloud data is stored with Supabase (a hosting provider) and protected by row-level security so one family can never read another family's data. Access is limited to the account owner and, for a class, the child's own teacher — who sees nicknames and progress only.
3. What we never collect
- Children's full legal names, home addresses, or phone numbers.
- Precise location or photos. The camera is off by default and requests nothing; if a family turns on optional card scanning, it runs only while scanning, on the device only — no photo is ever saved and nothing from the camera ever leaves the device.
- Contacts, browsing history, or activity on other apps and sites.
- Any advertising or cross-site tracking identifiers.
4. Voice input
AcornSmarts has an optional voice-input mode so a pre-reader can speak a number instead of tapping. It is off by default. When on, it uses your device's or browser's built-in speech recognition. AcornSmarts itself stores no audio and sends no audio anywhere. Whether the browser processes audio on-device or via its own service is governed by your browser maker's policy.
5. Payments
If you ever purchase a paid plan, card payments are handled by Stripe. AcornSmarts never sees or stores your full card number — Stripe does, under its own PCI-compliant policy.
6. Children's privacy (COPPA) & student data (FERPA)
AcornSmarts is intended to be set up and managed by a parent, guardian, or teacher. Consistent with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), we do not knowingly collect personal information directly from children — the app runs on nicknames, and by default nothing leaves the device at all. When used through a school, we act as a school service provider: teacher-visible data is limited to a child's nickname, avatar, grade, and progress, in support of the school's educational purpose (FERPA). We do not use student data for advertising or any commercial purpose beyond providing the service.
7. Your choices & deleting your data
- Delete on-device data — clear it any time from Settings, or by clearing your browser's site data.
- Delete a cloud account — Settings → account → delete. This permanently removes your account and your children's synced data from our systems.
- Ask us — email the address below and we will delete or export your data on request.
8. Changes to this policy
If we change how AcornSmarts handles data, we will update this page and the "last updated" date above. Material changes affecting how student data is handled will be communicated to school partners directly.