Privacy, in plain words

The short version

You can use the lessons without an account. We do not sell personal information or use advertising trackers. We use limited information to save progress, provide features you choose, count visits, send requested email, or process a payment.

Optional workshop reflection

Individual observation and learner self-check sheets stay with the learner, family, school, or program. Do not send those sheets to AbleMakers. An adult facilitator may choose to send a name-free group summary with only a setting category, group size, fixed-choice totals, a repeat decision, and supports to try next time. In a one-person or small group, those totals can still describe one learner. Tell learners before sending and follow your program's privacy rules.

The summary form has no fields for names, email addresses, organizations, diagnoses, or written notes, but AbleMakers does not claim that small-group answers are fully anonymous. A random one-time request code helps prevent a retry from sending the same summary twice; it is not a learner or account ID. To slow repeated requests, the server uses the request's network address in temporary server-instance memory. It is not included in the summary email. Resend processes the validated group summary to deliver it to the private AbleMakers inbox. Vercel Analytics receives only a fixed event saying that a summary succeeded, not the answers or counts.

Learning without an account

Your learner name, buddy choice, display settings, and lesson progress save in this browser. They stay on this device unless you choose to sign in. Personalized voice clips can also be cached on this device so they do not need to be made again.

Optional account and cloud sync

If you make an account, Firebase processes your email address and sign-in details. AbleMakers then stores a cloud copy of your learner name, buddy choice, colors, text size, completed lessons, stars, badges, trophies, and practice-chat choices. This is what lets your shelf and settings follow you to another device.

On learning, sign-in, shelf, and settings pages, Firebase Auth may first check this browser for an existing sign-in session, including when you are currently signed out. That check does not upload lesson progress. Progress and settings are copied to Firebase only after an account is signed in.

You do not need an account to learn. You can keep everything on one device instead.

Optional personalized voice

Saving a nickname does not turn this on by itself. If you check the special-voice choice, some known lesson sentences can include that nickname. AbleMakers sends the lesson sentence and chosen voice to OpenAI through our server. OpenAI returns an audio clip, and the browser can save it on this device. Turning the choice off removes those locally cached clips. Use a nickname, not a full legal name or other private information.

On supported browsers, the setup screen also offers a microphone button for saying a nickname. The browser's speech service may process the audio and gives AbleMakers the resulting text. Typing or skipping the nickname avoids that microphone feature.

Email and pilot requests

If an adult joins our email list, Resend processes and stores the email address so we can send AbleMakers news. We also record the signup time, the AbleMakers form used, and the consent wording version so an address is not treated as a subscriber without a clear request. Every marketing email includes a one-step way to unsubscribe.

If an adult asks about a workshop pilot, Resend stores the submitted work email in a separate partner-interest list so we can follow up about that request. A pilot request does not join the AbleMakers newsletter.

Payments

Donations and sponsorships are processed by Stripe, a payment company used by millions of businesses. Your card number goes to Stripe, never to us. Stripe shares payment details such as your name, email, and payment status with us so we can record the support and send a receipt or requested updates.

Anonymous visit counts

We use Vercel Web Analytics to learn which public pages bring people to AbleMakers and whether people start or finish a lesson. It does not use cookies. Vercel may process a page template, an approved campaign label, the referring website supplied by the browser, the visit time, approximate location, browser, operating system, and device type. We view combined results, not learner profiles.

Before a page view leaves the browser, AbleMakers removes query details, replaces lesson addresses with general templates, rejects campaign values we did not create, and prevents the browser from attaching the current page as a referrer. Our event code adds only action names and authored lesson or placement slugs. It does not add learner names, email addresses, chat answers, audio, diagnoses, or account IDs.

What we don't do

We don't sell your information. We don't run advertising trackers. We don't buy data about you. We do not ask for a diagnosis, medical information, or a learner's age. We collect the minimum we need to run the mission.

Children

Accounts, email signup, payments, and the optional group-summary form are for people 18 and older. Learners under 18 participate with a parent or guardian, who must create and manage any account. A caregiver, teacher, or other trusted person can also help any learner decide whether to use a nickname, personalized voice, or cloud account. Please use a nickname, never a full legal name.

Questions or requests

Turning off the special-voice choice deletes its clips from that browser. Want an account, cloud progress, or email-list information deleted? Think a child's information was entered without the right adult help? Email us at hello@ablemakers.org and a human will take care of the request.