Discord App Pitch 2023 - Education Submission
Below is my entire submission for the Discord App Pitches 2023 event, copied and pasted directly from the submission form. (Aside from the additional mockup material: this was a link to a website with the same mockups)
If you’d like to join me in my pursuit for greater knowledge for everyone, check out my revision website and app, iBaguette.com!
Envisioned by draggie | @draggie306
Last modified: 10/10/2023 19:58pm
Do you have a server for your app users to get support, visit, or hang out? (Optional)
Yes! I’ve spent a while growing a small community that is linked to my website and its resources, as well as bot support/question answering.
Have you been paid for development (Discord or other) before?
No, but I have been offered payment to develop a few programs.
Idea Name
The Revision Portal
What’s the summary of your app pitch?
An app which acts as a personal tutor for education. It will be capable of knowing exam specifications & mark schemes and can grade user-inputted answers; users can also earn points and compete with friends, family, and others in the server or globally. Various revision techniques like spaced retrieval and flashcards will be used by the app to help with learning content, bringing a mix of socialisation, competitiveness and education together.
Target audience
This will be mainly student and teacher-oriented but has the potential to be used in classrooms and lecture halls in universities. Teachers could set up classes within a server with the App and people may be able to use it within Discord, or answer questions on an external website with student progress being updated live in the server. Likewise, student communities could set up competitions and score challenges to learn the most content.
Overall, it’s designed for students and educators, and would also be able to be used by friends and family too for quiz features - see scenarios for more!
How might you add a premium offering to your app?
I plan on adding Bronze, Silver and Gold tiers of premium subscriptions, as well as a one-time purchase option. The premium subscriptions could be used to include (more) AI-assisted marking and grading of answers - depending on subscription tier - according to mark schemes, as APIs for LLMs are fairly expensive. Depending on maintenance costs for specific aspects of the App, such as a web leaderboard view for teachers or live test feedback, bronze subscribers could do ~10 per month, with more for Silver and Gold subscribers. People purchasing subscriptions would be heavy users and invested in using the App, so they would also have priority and better user support over those without.
There may also be one-time offers for teachers who could use the app across various classes, or courses within the app could be custom-made and modified by those with a premium plan.
Tell us about you!
I’m a UK-based A-level Computer Scientist, Geographer and French enthusiast with a passion for helping other people through providing free resources and ideas.
What scenario(s) do you see people using your app for most often?
There are many scenarios for which I see the app being used: firstly within a classroom as a friendlier alternative to other intrusive websites which do not have intuitive designs. Teachers will be able to assign student accounts and manage their own personal server classroom with the app inside, allowing students to revise in an online class with other classmates when not in person, whilst still being led by the teacher. This is a new design concept which has not been seen before - especially in a communications-focused app.
Secondly, the content of the app will provide a huge range of information targeting students. Because of this, new innovative solutions are required to ensure this is engaging and informative whilst remaining fun. I believe that the features I’ll add, such as spaced notification reminders in direct messages for key concepts or vocabulary, will be received well and widely used, based on some initial ‘market research’. Learning should not feel like a chore, so I see people using the app as a fun way to gradually absorb information they need to know, ultimately helping them with an improved education. Within this, the ‘personal tutor’ aspect is highlighted, with dynamic suggestions being created and content to learn and revise.
A third scenario in which the app may be used is for friends and unaffiliated (with a teacher) groups. With a premium version, even non-academic communities could take advantage of this proposal, for example creating a general-purpose knowledge quiz night or fun family gathering, with live feedback being projected on a screen as people answer and respond to questions which the app creates (taking the awkwardness away from extended family meetups!). I see the app being used as a fast way to create and reuse professional but curated and enjoyable activities by many audiences in a way never done before, adding value to not only the lives of these people but also (attempting to) improve their relationships.
In all scenarios (but where applicable) the evidence-based spaced retrieval and repetition technique of learning would also be transformed from a general chore to a fun, community activity, with daily incentives to repeat existing and learn new content through both using slash commands and also through these notification reminders.
What needs might this app meet, or what problems might this app be solving?
There’s a growing need to bring accessible and unified access to educational services, especially those in regions globally with low levels of infrastructure and in economically challenged areas – 58.4 million children at primary school age do not attend. With the increasing availability of internet access and mobile phones in rural regions, building this app within the Discord ecosystem makes so much sense with the already-established content delivery and availability, solving the issue of deliverability and optimisation. The app itself solves the second worldwide issue: so many students not only in more economically challenged regions but also developed countries are not motivated and do not enjoy going to an educational institution, which I believe is a real shame.
By building the app online, so many of these issues and challenges are solved, in a more informal and friendly way, unlike more formal and established services like Google Classroom or Bromcom cannot provide. From my experience in helping out and motivating this increasingly large group of people, I believe that this will meet the needs of the people who need assistance the most, without them feeling like they need it. Finally, although most countries and languages are largely supported for online learning and platforms in general, languages other than English are largely put on a back burner and aren’t the priority. I would ensure that all of my features before launching are fully nationalised using either AI LLMs or crowdsourced language contribution sites, prioritising lesser-spoken languages and ensuring compatibility with all language backgrounds.
Do you have any supporting visuals, like mocks or wireframes? This is optional, but share a link if you’ve got ‘em! (optional)
I haven’t had much time to create mockups but here’s the general idea. This is just for one aspect of the App:
Multiple choice questions (any):
"This is a screenshot of a unique feature of the Revision Portal bot on Discord. The bot is interactive and engages users in a trivia game, making learning fun and competitive. In this instance, the bot is asking a multiple-choice question about the capital of Ghana, with options including Accra, Kumasi, Cape Coast, and Tamale.
Users have 10 seconds to answer the question, adding an element of excitement and urgency to the learning process. Correct answers can earn the user up to 1,000 points, providing a rewarding experience for gaining knowledge.
The bot also displays the user’s current points and their position in the game at the top of the message, a feature encouraging friendly competition among users and motivating them to learn more to improve their ranking.
The Revision Portal bot transforms learning from a solitary task into a communal and enjoyable activity, thereby enhancing the educational experience on the platform."
Vocabulary checker (language learning):
Group quiz (family/quiz night):
Spaced retrieval (any):
More are available at request, text limit hit!
Are you creating this app for an underrepresented demographic?
Not directly, however I would be prioritising lesser-spoken languages and ensuring compatibility with all language backgrounds as well as English, for use in non-anglophone countries.
(If premium version was selected): tell us more about your SKUs
N/A
How would you approach maintaining the app?
Throughout the development lifecycle, I’ll be using the agile development model which is an iterative approach, with tasks and features being decomposed into smaller chunks which get developed and eventually maintained and refactored if needed. In order to maintain the app, it would be fully open-source on GitHub, with issue templates that, when submitted, I will review on a regular basis.
I would also think about using a Discord server to have people suggest new features with dedicated channels for the development pipeline, bug reporting and suggestions. I would also designate developer roles and give code review access to developers with a good reputation in the server, and if critical bugs arise they would be able to make essential changes and fix them if/when required. With the rapid innovation in and readjustment of the educational landscape, user suggestions would create a sustainable ecosystem which adapts to the requests of the App’s users. This would also allow development and maintenance to continue if I have exams or do not have the time to maintain or engage with the community.
I have some experience hosting apps on Replit, Heroku, Google Cloud Platform, AWS and locally, so I would happily host it for as long as people are interested in using it. Existing educational resources such as websites have been established for and have continued contracts to run for many years, so ~5 years at a minimum would be my goal. I passionately believe in providing free, unified access to educational resources, so even if it has 10 users after these 5 years, I would still be extremely happy to continue to host it.
fin.
Thanks for reading! Hope it’s useful for somebody out there.
If I’d won the Pitch, all my earnings would have been reinvested into creating a wide range of more revision material to help out as many people as possible :)