Version of 30 August 2026. These rules apply to all user reviews on course and school pages.
Status of the review feature
The user review form launches later: we are first building the verification process so that unverified ratings are never published. Until the form goes live, course and school pages carry graduate interviews (with consent, stating the course and study period) and editorial checks (trial access, analysis of the offer agreement and curriculum). These rules describe how the review system will work after launch so that schools and users know the terms in advance.
Why rules are needed
Course reviews are the most manipulated part of the online education market: fake reviews, orchestrated negative campaigns, school employees posing as students. Our goal is for every review on EduCompass Hub to be written by a real student about real experience. That is why we require specific content, proof of purchase and a public right of reply for schools.
Post-moderation
A review is published on submission and checked by a moderator within three business days. The moderator checks compliance with the rules, not whether the review is "convenient" for the school or the site. A review that breaks the rules is unpublished, with a notice to the author (if a contact is given) stating the reason. The author may fix the review and resubmit it.
Review requirements
We publish reviews that contain:
- real learning experience — you took the course yourself (in full or a substantial part) or paid for it for your child;
- the course and study period — the programme name and approximate dates (month and year of start and finish);
- the plan — which package you bought (for example "basic", "with a mentor", "in instalments"), because experience differs between plans;
- pros and cons — at least one specific point in each category. One-word or purely emotional reviews are not published;
- the outcome — what you got: a skill, a project, a document, a job, or why you did not.
Minimum length is 300 characters. A review is written in the first person and contains no links. A 1-to-5 rating accompanies the text but is not published separately.
What is prohibited
- Anonymous smear campaigns — accusations without facts, hearsay reviews, negativity on behalf of "a friend".
- Links — to other schools, promo codes, third-party sites, messengers.
- Insults aimed at instructors, school staff or other users; discriminatory statements; personal data of third parties.
- Manipulation — several reviews from one person, reviews with identical text, reviews paid for by a school or a competitor, reviews written from a school's template.
- Reviews by school employees and contractors (including former ones) without disclosing that fact. A disclosed connection is allowed: the review is labelled "school employee".
- Reviews by competitors and reviews posted on a school's instructions about other schools' courses.
- Advertising in any form, including "you'd better go to …".
- Generated text with no real experience behind it.
Proof of purchase
A moderator may ask the author for proof of study: a screenshot of the student dashboard or enrolment e-mail, a receipt, a certificate or a diploma. Any document showing the school, the course and the student's name (or e-mail) is enough. The proof:
- is sent to the editorial e-mail address and is never published;
- is kept for no longer than 90 days after verification and then deleted;
- is not required for publication, but without it the review has no verified status and may be removed if the school complains.
Reviews for which proof has been received are labelled "Verified by document". This status is the only criterion by which a review may be quoted in editorial collections.
A school's right of public reply
A school whose course is reviewed may post a public reply beneath the review. The reply is published on the school's behalf with the label "Official school reply" once we have confirmed that the author represents the school (an e-mail from the corporate domain). The reply must address the substance of the review; replies containing advertising, insults or disclosure of the student's data are not published.
A school may also flag a review it believes breaks the rules or was not written by a student. In that case the moderator asks the author for proof of purchase; if no proof arrives within 10 days, the review is removed.
Aggregate rating
We do not build an overall rating of a course or school from user scores and do not publish one in structured data (AggregateRating) for search engines while reviews remain unverified. We also do not import ratings from other platforms and do not show an "average across the internet". The user rating ★ is shown separately from Compass Score 🧭 and only from reviews with the "Verified by document" status, once there are at least five of them for a course. Compass Score is assigned by the editorial team under the methodology, and reviews do not affect it directly: they serve as a signal to re-check.
Editing and deleting a review
- A moderator may fix spelling and remove links and third-party personal data; the meaning of the review is not changed.
- The author may ask for their review to be deleted or changed at any time by writing to the editorial address from the same e-mail used when submitting the review (or by confirming authorship another way). We delete within 5 business days. More about your rights is in the Privacy Policy.
- Reviews older than three years are labelled "outdated": the programme and price usually change over that time.
Graduate interviews and editorial checks
Until the review form launches, we publish interviews with graduates we have contacted ourselves. Each interview states the course, plan and study period; the graduate confirms their studies with a document that we do not publish. Editorial checks (trial access, offer agreement analysis) are published with a date and an evidence level, as described in the methodology.
Contacts
Questions about reviews, complaints, proof of study and deletion requests: the editorial e-mail address. Other contacts are on the Contacts page.