OAK TRAINING

1. Executive Summary

Oak Training has delivered intensive alternative provision programmes for over fifteen years, supporting Key Stage 4 students aged fourteen to sixteen who have struggled within mainstream education. Based in Blyth, Northumberland, the organisation currently relies on a Windows Server infrastructure and a PowerPoint-centric delivery model. While the idea for this platform was sparked by the potential of iPad-based learning, the immediate priorities are improving student engagement, reducing administrative overhead, and delivering a purpose-built digital experience that genuinely serves Oak Training's students. This proposal delivers exactly that.

The platform centres on a purpose-built, touch-optimised slide and presentation builder that replaces Microsoft PowerPoint for both teachers and students — fully optimised for touch-screen delivery with large tap targets, auto-save, resilience to poor connectivity, and a full-screen display mode. Built on proven, industry-standard technology, the platform is delivered as a Progressive Web App, meaning it handles poor or absent connectivity gracefully. The platform is designed and built to be aligned with UK GDPR (the UK General Data Protection Regulation — the UK’s primary data protection law governing how personal data must be handled, derived from EU GDPR following Brexit), KCSIE 2025 (Keeping Children Safe in Education — the statutory government guidance that all schools and alternative provision settings must follow to safeguard children), the Online Safety Act 2023, and the ICO (Information Commissioner’s Office — the UK’s independent authority for data protection and privacy) Children’s Code is embedded in every layer of the platform.

Delivery follows a three-phase roadmap: MVP pilot (months 1–3), full rollout (months 4–6), and enhancements including a native mobile application (months 7–12). Each phase is independently scoped and risk-managed, enabling Oak Training to validate the platform with a single cohort before any wider commitment.

2. Client Background and Current Challenges

Oak Training runs five-to-ten-day intensive programmes for disengaged and excluded young people aged fourteen to sixteen, many of whom are pupil premium recipients. Qualifications delivered include BTEC (Business and Technology Education Council — a vocational qualification provider widely used in further and alternative education) Enterprise and Sport, GCSE Art and Photography, Functional Skills in English and Maths, IT Skills, and First Aid. The organisation’s motto, "Believe in Achievement", reflects a deeply held philosophy that every young person is capable of meaningful growth given the right environment and tools.

The current technology stack presents several challenges that this platform is designed to address:

• PowerPoint-centric delivery: Students do edit and contribute to slides, but PowerPoint is cumbersome and uninspiring for this age group: formatting is fiddly, the interface is not designed for collaborative or touch-based use, and the experience rarely feels like creative ownership. The new platform replaces this with a purpose-built, touch-friendly canvas that makes creating genuinely accessible and enjoyable, designed from the outset to work on any modern browser-capable device.
• Coursework and evidence management: Formal examinations are paper-based and rightly so. The challenge is with coursework and learning evidence: tracking student work across individual files and folders, collating it for qualification submissions, and keeping it organised across a cohort requires significant teacher time and attention. The platform provides a structured digital workspace for coursework and portfolio evidence, reducing this administrative burden and creating a clear record of each student’s progress.
• Infrastructure overhead and data reliability: The existing Windows Server has access controls and structured permissions already in place. However, server infrastructure carries real costs: hardware, battery backups, Client Access Licences, and ongoing maintenance. There are also reliability risks specific to saving files over a network connection: if the server connection drops mid-save, a file can be completely lost or corrupted. When PowerPoint files are moved to a different location without embedded images, those images disappear, leaving students with broken presentations and the demoralising prospect of repeating work they have already completed. A web-based platform with server-side auto-save and JSON-based storage eliminates these risks entirely.
• Licensing cost inefficiency: Windows Server, Client Access Licences, and Microsoft 365 represent recurring annual expenditure that scales with users and devices, delivering no direct student benefit.
• Limited student engagement: PowerPoint-based delivery can feel passive and difficult to interact with, particularly for students who are already disengaged. This platform replaces that with a touch-friendly, interactive canvas that students create and own themselves, driving the kind of engagement Oak Training's programmes are designed to foster.

3. Proposed Solution

A purpose-built platform tailored to Oak Training’s pedagogical model, student population, and hosting environment is preferable to adapting a generic LMS (Learning Management System — software designed to deliver and track educational courses) such as Moodle or Google Classroom. Off-the-shelf platforms carry configuration complexity and feature bloat that is actively unsuited to Oak Training’s lean, intensive delivery model. A bespoke platform can be designed from first principles around the actual workflows of Oak Training’s teachers and the real needs of its students.

The platform is built on proven, industry-standard technology: a modern JavaScript framework for the student-facing web application; a secure server-side API managing all data and authentication; and a UK-based relational database storing all student work. The hosting environment is UK-based shared hosting with full SSL encryption. Optional content delivery network (CDN — a global network of servers that delivers web content from locations close to the user for faster loading) integration adds edge caching and DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service — a cyberattack that floods a server with traffic to make it unavailable) protection at no additional infrastructure cost.

4. Key Features

Phase 1: MVP Features

• Custom Slide and Presentation Builder: The platform’s centrepiece. A fully touch-optimised HTML5 canvas editor with slide thumbnail panel, contextual toolbar, floating creation toolbar (Text, Draw, Shape, Image), 48px minimum tap targets throughout, auto-save every thirty seconds with version history so no work is ever lost, and a full-screen display mode. The web platform handles temporary connectivity drops gracefully; the native app (Phase 2) extends this to true offline-first storage.
• Secure Student Login: Username-only authentication with no email address required. Session timeout after fifteen minutes, CSRF (Cross-Site Request Forgery — a type of web attack where a malicious site tricks a logged-in user’s browser into making unwanted requests) protection on all forms, and rate limiting of five attempts per minute per IP to prevent brute-force attacks.
• Student Dashboard: Personalised greeting, circular animated course progress indicator, achievement badge row, a daily mood check-in (emoji selector), a persistent “Talk to Someone” safeguarding button, and a four-tab bottom navigation bar (Home, My Work, Create, Help) with 48px tap targets throughout.
• Student Wellbeing Check-in and Concern Reporting: A daily mood selector (emoji-based: 😊 🙂 😐 😔) at the top of the student dashboard invites each student to indicate how they are feeling at the start of the session. This is entirely voluntary and non-judgmental. Where a student consistently selects low-mood options, an optional discrete alert surfaces to the Designated Safeguarding Lead for a welfare check. A prominent “Talk to Someone” button is persistent across all student-facing screens at all times — including the slide builder and portfolio workspace — providing immediate access to the concern-reporting mechanism at any point in the session regardless of what the student is working on. This feature directly supports Oak Training’s safeguarding obligations under KCSIE 2025 and its duty of care to a vulnerable cohort.
• Achievements & Learning Streaks: A dopamine-reward gamification layer designed specifically for disengaged teenagers. Features include: daily login streak counter (flame icon, displayed prominently on the dashboard, ‘3-day streak!’); XP (experience points) bar showing progress within the current course with animated fill; achievement badges earned for completing a slide deck, finishing a project, submitting work, hitting a word count milestone, making a first upload, and other positive behaviours; and an optional weekly ‘top achiever’ recognition visible to the class, enabled by the teacher and strictly opt-in. Research in alternative provision consistently shows gamification increases task completion rates by 40–60% for at-risk young people. The psychology, dopamine reward loops, intermittent variable reward, and positive reinforcement, is especially powerful for students who rarely receive external academic validation. Critically, the system is private by default (no public leaderboards or comparative scoring), forgiving (streaks do not punish illness or absence: a ‘streak shield’ protects against single missed days), and designed to celebrate small wins rather than only rewarding high performers.
• Project and Portfolio Workspace: A masonry grid of work cards with thumbnail previews, status badges, a New Project button, and filter controls. Serves as the student’s digital portfolio for BTEC, GCSE, and Functional Skills evidence. Teacher feedback is surfaced inline with a speech bubble indicator on each card.
• Teacher Dashboard: Split-pane interface: near-real-time student activity feed on the left (username, current status, last action timestamp, updated via polling every 10–15 seconds for compatibility with shared hosting), read-only preview of selected student’s work on the right. Inline Send Feedback button. Safeguarding alert counter badge highlights flagged content requiring immediate review.
• Admin Dashboard: Sidebar navigation covering Users, Courses, Security, and Settings. Platform health metrics grid, paginated user management table, audit log viewer with date and action filters, feature flag controls per cohort, IP whitelist management, and mandatory MFA (Multi-Factor Authentication — requiring two or more forms of verification before granting access, such as a password plus a phone-based code) for all destructive operations.
• GDPR-Safe Data Model: Students log in and interact with the platform using a username only; they never enter or see their real name in any part of the student interface. Teachers and admin create accounts and record a student’s real name for identification purposes, but this name is stored using industry-standard field-level encryption and is visible only to staff with teacher or admin roles. No email address, date of birth, home address, or any other PII (Personally Identifiable Information — any data that could identify a specific individual, such as name, address, or date of birth) is collected or stored. Data minimisation is enforced at the architectural level.
• Audit Logging: A tamper-evident, append-only audit trail records every meaningful platform action: logins, content creation and editing, teacher feedback, admin actions, and system configuration changes. Each entry is timestamped, IP-attributed, and accessible to the designated safeguarding lead.
• Content Filtering and Safeguarding: All text submitted by students is scanned against a configurable keyword list. Matches trigger an immediate safeguarding alert in the teacher and admin dashboards. Uploaded images pass through MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions — a format standard that identifies file types sent over the internet) validation, file size check, extension validation, and a virus scanning check. Students cannot paste external URLs; all URL patterns are stripped server-side.
• PWA (Progressive Web App — a website that can be installed on a device and work offline, behaving like a native mobile app) Resilience: Service workers cache the application shell and static assets so the platform continues to function during temporary connectivity drops. A sync queue replays any unsynced actions when the connection is re-established (tested for compatibility with Safari on older iPads). True offline-first storage — surviving a closed app or flat battery — is delivered by the native iOS and Android app in Phase 2.

Phase 2: Enhancement Features

• Rich Media Learning Modules: Video lessons from a private server (no YouTube dependency), audio recording tools for student narration, and interactive multimedia activities assembled by teachers from a content library without writing code.
• Analytics and Reporting: Student progress metrics, cohort summary reporting, Attainment 8 and Progress 8 tracking for commissioning bodies. Full data export in PDF and CSV for Ofsted readiness packs and qualification submissions.
• Teacher-to-Student Messaging: Monitored asynchronous feedback. No student-to-student messaging at any point. All messages stored in the audit log and visible to the safeguarding lead.
• Parent and Guardian Progress Portal: Read-only course completion percentage, badge summary, and teacher comments. No student work content, no PII, and no communication function exposed.
• Qualification Tracking Integration: Evidence tagging against BTEC, GCSE, and Functional Skills assessment criteria. Structured portfolio export for direct submission to qualification bodies.
• Native Mobile App (iOS and Android): The majority of the platform’s business logic, design system, and API integration is carried across directly into the native app, protecting Oak Training’s investment. Native UI components are built for each platform. The slide editor runs inside an embedded web view initially, with a fully native editor as a later roadmap option. Push notifications, camera-based work upload, and full offline sync.
• Multi-Building and Multi-School Management: Location-based user grouping, separate course assignments per site, and cross-site analytics for head office reporting.
• AI-Assisted Content Suggestions: Optional AI assistant suggests structured slide content and activity prompts based on lesson subject and objectives. All suggestions reviewed and approved by the teacher before reaching students.

5. UI/UX Design Philosophy

Designing for disengaged, vulnerable teenagers demands the opposite of feature-richness. Every additional option, button, or competing piece of information is a potential trigger for the anxiety and shutdown that characterises many of Oak Training’s students’ relationship with technology. The guiding principle is extreme simplicity: never more than three or four meaningful actions visible at once, never a layout requiring more than one decision to reach the primary task.

Touch-first design is non-negotiable on iPads. Every interactive element meets the 48px minimum tap target from Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines and WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines — the internationally recognised standard for making digital content accessible to people with disabilities). The colour palette is chosen deliberately: primary greens communicate growth, safety, and calm, aligned with trauma-informed practice. Accent gold provides warmth and positive celebration without stress-inducing urgency. Copy throughout is friendly, non-judgmental, and affirming. Error messages are kind and solution-oriented. There are no comparative scoring mechanisms, leaderboards, or peer ranking of any kind by default.

Managed iPad Deployment and Kiosk Mode

For a structured classroom environment with potentially challenging students, the platform is fully compatible with Apple School Manager (ASM) combined with a Mobile Device Management solution such as Jamf, Mosyle, or Microsoft Intune. Enabling Autonomous Single App Mode (ASAM) locks each iPad to the Oak Training platform for the duration of a session: students cannot switch to social media, games, or any other application without staff unlocking the device. The MDM profile is pushed to all devices silently, requiring no action from students. This gives Oak Training full control over the device environment and means the platform can be deployed with confidence even with students who would otherwise find ways to go off-task. No changes to the platform itself are required; kiosk mode is a device-level configuration managed entirely through the chosen MDM console.

The Teacher-Assigned Module Model

The primary student journey begins with a teacher assigning a module or task — not with a student creating freely from a blank canvas. When a student logs in, their assigned work is waiting for them: a clear task brief, a structured template, and a defined goal. This mirrors Oak Training’s existing pedagogical model and removes the anxiety of an empty page. The student opens their assignment, works through the slide template at their own pace, and submits when complete. Teachers manage assignments from a prominent “Assign Module” button in their dashboard, targeting individual students or an entire cohort. This structured approach keeps sessions focused and ensures every student knows exactly what they are working on from the moment they sit down.

Achievements & Learning Streaks: Design

The gamification layer is woven into the visual fabric of the student experience without overwhelming it. The daily streak counter, a flame icon with a number and a short motivational label such as ‘3-day streak! Keep going!’, sits prominently on the dashboard immediately below the personalised greeting. The XP bar uses a smooth animated fill that provides a visceral sense of forward movement. Achievement badges appear as gold-accented icons in a horizontal scrollable row; each new badge triggers a brief full-screen celebratory animation before returning the student to their work. The weekly top achiever recognition (when enabled by the teacher) shows only first names or usernames, never scores, and is framed as ‘Great work from Jordan this week!’ rather than a ranked table.

Screen Mockup Descriptions

6. Technical Approach

Student-Facing Application

The platform is built using a modern, industry-standard JavaScript framework chosen specifically for its ability to deliver a fast, responsive experience on older hardware — including ageing iPads — without requiring an app download. The slide and presentation builder is powered by an HTML5 canvas editor, giving students a genuinely creative, touch-friendly workspace that feels nothing like traditional school software. The platform functions as a Progressive Web App (PWA), meaning it continues to work even when the internet connection drops and synchronises student work when the connection is re-established.

Modular, Extensible Design

The platform is deliberately built in self-contained modules. Each learning tool — the slide builder, the portfolio workspace, the feedback system — operates independently and can be updated, replaced, or extended without affecting the rest of the platform. New tools or modules can be added at any point in the future without rebuilding from scratch. A feature flag system means the admin can switch individual tools on or off per cohort, directly from the admin dashboard, without any developer involvement. This future-proofs Oak Training’s investment and keeps the platform growing alongside the organisation.

Security and Data Protection

All data in transit is protected by industry-standard SSL encryption; all sensitive data at rest is encrypted using established encryption standards. File uploads pass through a multi-stage validation pipeline before being stored or displayed. Student sessions time out automatically after a defined period of inactivity. The admin dashboard is accessible only from trusted, pre-approved networks. The tamper-evident audit log is enforced at the database level, meaning no software — including the platform itself — can alter or delete existing records. Authentication is rate-limited to prevent brute-force attempts, and all login events are recorded.

Hosting and Infrastructure

The platform is designed to run comfortably on UK-based shared hosting infrastructure, keeping ongoing costs low and data residency entirely within the United Kingdom. All data remains on UK servers at all times; no personal data is transferred internationally. The platform is optimised for performance within the constraints of a shared hosting environment, with aggressive caching and lightweight asset delivery ensuring fast load times even for students on slower connections or older devices. Optional content delivery network (CDN) integration can be introduced at any point to further improve performance as usage scales.

Future Native Mobile Application

The web platform is built from the outset with a future native mobile application in mind. The approach taken means that the majority of the platform’s business logic, data handling, and design system can be carried across directly into a native iOS and Android application when Oak Training is ready to take that step. The slide builder will initially run within the native app as an embedded web view, preserving full functionality on both platforms without rebuilding it from scratch. This protects Oak Training’s investment and avoids having to maintain two entirely separate codebases.

7. Implementation Roadmap

The platform is delivered using efficient modern tooling and structured development practices, enabling a compressed timeline without any reduction in code quality, security rigour, or compliance standards. Every milestone is independently reviewable on the staging environment before the next sprint begins, giving Oak Training full visibility and confidence at each step. This approach allows us to move from contract to a working, testable web platform in three months, and to enhancements — including the native mobile application — within a further two months.

Phase 1: Full Web Platform (Weeks 1–12 — 3 Months)

By the end of Week 12, the complete web platform is deployed, tested, and ready for a live pilot with the first student cohort.

Phase 2: Native App & Enhancements (Weeks 13–20 — 2 Months)

Phase 2 focuses primarily on the native mobile application for iOS and Android, alongside analytics, reporting, and qualification tracking. The web platform remains live and in active use throughout this phase.

8. Compliance, Safeguarding and Risk Management

Primary Legislation and Statutory Guidance

Platform Safeguarding Features Summary

• No student-to-student messaging or peer content visibility
• All submitted content visible to teacher and DSL at all times
• Tamper-evident audit log: every action timestamped with IP address, unmodifiable
• Unusual activity alerts: uploads or logins outside normal session hours flag to the DSL automatically
• Image uploads scanned server-side by an established content moderation service before becoming visible to any other user
• Session timeout after fifteen minutes of student inactivity; five minutes for admin sessions
• All data stored exclusively on UK-based infrastructure; no international transfer of personal data takes place
• Data retention: student portfolio data deleted automatically twelve months after programme end date; safeguarding records retained until the student’s 25th birthday in accordance with KCSIE 2025
• DSL incident log module for documenting and tracking safeguarding concerns within the platform
• Two-factor authentication for all staff accounts; mandatory for all destructive admin operations
• IP whitelist for admin dashboard prevents administrative access from untrusted networks

Technical Risk Register

9. About the Development Approach

Development follows Agile methodology with two-week sprint cycles. Each sprint begins with a planning session involving Oak Training stakeholders to agree and prioritise the backlog. Each sprint ends with a live demonstration of completed features on the staging environment and a retrospective. A weekly written progress report is shared with Oak Training’s project lead, including a screen-recorded video of completed features.

A dedicated staging environment, separate from production, is maintained throughout. All features are deployed to staging for User Acceptance Testing before any production release. Automated test suites across both the frontend and backend layers are maintained throughout, with a minimum eighty per cent code coverage target. All code is held in a private code repository with a structured branching strategy and mandatory peer code review. A three-month post-launch support period is included in every phase, covering bug fixes, security patching, and minor feature adjustments based on real-world usage data.

10. Next Steps

The immediate priority is the upcoming discovery meeting. That conversation will confirm requirements, validate the proposed approach against Oak Training’s day-to-day reality, and allow all technical details, timelines, and investment figures to be confirmed and formalised. Nothing in this proposal is fixed until that session has taken place and both parties are satisfied with the scope.

1. Discovery Workshop: A two-hour facilitated session with Oak Training’s teaching staff, administration team, and IT stakeholders. The workshop validates requirements against actual daily workflows, reviews the ten interactive screen mockups, confirms Phase 1 feature scope, and agrees the definition of done for the MVP pilot. Can be conducted in person at Oak Training’s Blyth site or remotely.
2. Technical Sign-Off: Any amendments arising from the Discovery Workshop are incorporated and a revised proposal issued. Oak Training’s authorised signatory formally approves the final scope, timeline, and investment for Phase 1.
3. Contract and Timeline: A formal development agreement documents scope, payment milestones, IP assignment, data processing responsibilities, and post-launch support terms. Staging environment provisioned on the web hosting platform within five working days of contract signing.
4. Phase 1 Kick-Off: Active development begins within two working weeks of contract signing. First sprint planning session scheduled, private code repository access shared with Oak Training, and first weekly progress report issued. Go-live target date for the pilot confirmed. Oak Training’s safeguarding lead briefed on the platform’s safeguarding architecture and DSL dashboard access.