Question 1

How does Cohortis handle FERPA?

Accepted Answer

Cohortis is not a school and cannot certify an institution's FERPA compliance on its own. Cohortis provides controls commonly required for FERPA-governed use: grade and personally identifiable replies use ephemeral Discord messages, AES-GCM encrypts Discord OAuth tokens at rest, and /forgetme performs a right-to-erasure workflow across every user-keyed table. Institutions configure access under their own policies and contracts.

Question 2

Do students need to install an app?

Accepted Answer

No. Cohortis runs as a Discord bot inside servers students already use. Educators install Cohortis once; students interact through normal Discord channels and voice rooms.

Question 3

Which LMS does Cohortis sync with?

Accepted Answer

Canvas LMS today. Blackboard, Brightspace D2L, and Moodle are on the roadmap behind a shared LTI 1.3 Advantage implementation pass, sequenced when the first institutional procurement request justifies the work.

Question 4

Is the AI assistant grounded on the syllabus?

Accepted Answer

Yes. The /ask command runs against a pgvector retrieval pipeline that indexes the educator's uploaded syllabus + Canvas materials. Answers cite the source section, and responses outside the indexed material return 'I cannot find that information in the provided course material.'

Question 5

What does Cohortis cost?

Accepted Answer

Scholar is $0 forever with a 50-query AI cap. Fellow is $49 per educator per month billed annually ($588/yr) with a 21-day card-upfront trial. Institute starts at $12,000 per institution per year with multi-section classrooms, a signed DPA, and SSO + SCIM for design partners.

Question 6

Can I pilot without changing my whole programme?

Accepted Answer

Yes. One course, one cohort, one Discord server. Connect a single Canvas course, run a 21-day trial, and roll back at any point with /forgetme if it does not earn its place. There is no institution-wide commitment to start.

Question 7

Does Cohortis need IT approval?

Accepted Answer

Often no for small independent pilots, frequently yes for institutional deployment, especially when grades, SSO, or wider provisioning are in scope. The security page documents controls, and HECVAT-Lite plus DPA are available on request for procurement review.

Question 8

Why not use a generic Discord bot?

Accepted Answer

Generic Discord bots do not solve Canvas sync, do not enforce grade privacy, do not document retention, and do not produce procurement-ready review materials. Cohortis is the Canvas-to-Discord bridge plus the trust and compliance layer; a community bot is neither.

Question 9

Why a Discord-native bridge instead of a standalone classroom app?

Accepted Answer

The students you are teaching already live in Discord. Cohortis adds the bridge they are missing, not another app they will not open. Canvas stays the system of record; Discord becomes the channel they actually check; private grade replies stay private; and the AI assistant answers from your own syllabus with citations.