Thnkrr: who uses it today, and what each person does
27 October 2026 · Adarsh Kumar Pandey, Lead Engineer
What this document is for
This lists every kind of person Thnkrr has room for today: why they're on it, what they can do, what they can never do, and the path each person takes from joining to leaving. It covers what's built. Where something is built but switched off, or only a preview, it says so. Nothing that's only planned is described as working.
What we need from you: answers to the nine questions in the last section, for the college professors who've asked to join, and for any other kind of person you want on Thnkrr. Reading the rest first shows you what already exists, so you can tell us what's missing. Your answers tell us what to build and what safety rules it needs.
The one-minute version
Thnkrr has three kinds of account: students (in high school, 13 or older), college mentors (college students who help high schoolers) and teachers (staff at one high school). A person picks one when they sign up, and it stays that way for the life of the account.
Around those three are people with extra duties. A school tells us which of its teachers should run its page, confirm a student's parent before we email them, or be told when a student needs support, and we set that up. Our own safety team reviews anything our checks or members point out. Parents have no account: they get an email and say yes or no.
Only students network. Only students can post, connect or have a feed. Mentors and teachers each have one job and no social features.
The main safety rule shapes everything: no mentor or teacher can contact a student first on Thnkrr. A student has to ask a mentor for help before they can talk. Teachers can't message anyone at all. (Students who are 18 are still students: they connect and message other students the same way everyone else does.)
There is no place for professors or other college staff today. Teacher sign-up only lists high schools, and the mentor role is for college students. A professor who signed up now would either fail to find their college or show up as a "college student" in the mentor list, which would be wrong.
Words you'll see
| Word | What it means here |
|---|---|
| Confirmed | We've checked that this person really belongs to their school or college |
| School email | An address the school gives out, such as name@westfieldhigh.org |
| Class list | Everyone who signed up as a student at that school. A teacher checks it against the school's own records |
| Mentorship | A student asked a mentor for help and the mentor said yes |
| Connection | Two students who both agreed to connect, like on LinkedIn |
| Care referral | Our safety team tells a named teacher that a student may need support |
| Appeal | A member asks us to look again at a decision about their post or account |
| Hat | One duty on our safety team. A person can wear several |
Who's on Thnkrr today
| Who | Why they're here | Main things they do | Never allowed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Student | Build a profile, meet peers, find a mentor | Post, connect, message friends, ask mentors | See what strangers keep private |
| Parent or guardian | Give permission for under-18s | Approve or decline by email | Have an account or see the child's activity |
| College mentor | Help high schoolers with college questions | Appear in the mentor list; chat is off for now | Contact a student who hasn't asked |
| Teacher | Look after their school's presence, not networking | Confirm students, see school numbers | Post, connect, message anyone, read student messages |
| Teacher with extra duties | Named by the school for one job | Confirm parents, get care referrals, edit the page | Give themselves parent or care duties |
| Thnkrr safety team | Keep the platform safe and legal | Review what's been pointed out, suspend or ban | Use the app as a student or mentor |
| Visitor, signed out | Curious about Thnkrr | Join the waitlist, open a shared profile of someone 18+ | See any student under 18 |
Each role in a few sentences
Students
A student is in high school and 13 or older. Anyone younger can't join. Most are 13 to 17. A student who is 18 or over can still join, and skips the parent step. They come to Thnkrr to build a profile like a LinkedIn one, meet students at their own and other schools, and get advice from college students who've been where they are.
They get a feed of posts from other students, and can post writing, photos and videos, react and comment. They connect with other students, and once both agree, they can message each other. They can search for people, browse a page of suggested people, see who viewed their profile, and open their school's page. Thnkrr shows no follower counts or popularity numbers. The one achievement a profile can show is the college the student has committed to, and only if they choose to share it. Students choose who sees their profile and can report or block anyone.
The feature students want most is the mentor list. They search for college mentors, often by shared hometown or old high school, and send a request with a short note. If the mentor accepts, they get a private chat. This is switched off right now. Students can't send new requests, and existing chats can be read but not added to. It stays off until our automatic check for grooming is running. Grooming is when an adult tries to build trust with a child in order to harm them.
Every post and message is checked before anyone else sees it. A computer checks writing first and sends anything doubtful to a person on our safety team. Every photo and video is looked at by a person. If a student moves school, they ask to move and the new school confirms them.
Parents and guardians
A parent or guardian has no account. When a student under 18 signs up, they name a guardian. Nothing is sent until someone at the school has checked the student's age, that they're on the school's list, and who their guardian is. Then the guardian gets an email, reads what Thnkrr is, and approves or declines. They can withdraw permission later, which ends the child's access. When the student turns 18, the permission is no longer needed.
College mentors
A mentor is a current college student, 18 or older. They're here to help high schoolers with college choices and applications, often students from their own hometown or old school. They sign up with their college, year and the high school they went to, and prove their college email.
They appear in the mentor list, and accept or decline the requests that come in. Once they accept, they get a chat with that student and a limited view of them: name, grade, school, the college they've committed to, their goals and their milestones. They never see the student's other messages, connections or anything the student keeps private. A mentor can see this only for their own current mentees. Either side can end the mentorship. When it ends the chat stops but is kept, never deleted, in case it's ever needed for safety. While mentor chat is switched off, a mentor can be listed and seen but can't take on new students or send messages.
A mentor has no feed, no friend network and no way to search for students. They can't contact any student who hasn't asked them first. This is the most important safety rule on the platform.
Teachers
A teacher is an adult on the staff of one high school, and sees only that school. They're here so the school has a say in who's on Thnkrr and can see how its students are using it overall. They never see a student's messages or private activity.
Their main job is the class list: confirming that a student who signed up really is at their school. They also see school-wide numbers, such as how many students joined and how many have mentors, and can download those numbers and the list as a file. Their safety page shows sample numbers and says so, because the work that would fill it isn't running yet. Teachers have a profile that students can find in search, but nobody can connect with or message them. If the school asks us to, its teachers can also open their own students' profiles and see what a classmate would see.
Teachers don't network on Thnkrr. A teacher has no feed and no messages, can't post and can't connect with anyone, including other teachers. They can't message students, read any student's messages, see who a student is connected to, or see who reported whom.
Extra duties. A school tells us which teachers should take on one of these jobs, and we set it up. Only page admins can edit the school page:
| Duty | What they do | Who sets it |
|---|---|---|
| Page admin | Edit the school's public page | We set the first one; that person can add more |
| Parent checker | Confirm a student's age, school and guardian before the parent email goes out | We set it, as the school tells us |
| Care contact | Hear from our safety team when a student may need support, and check in with them in person at school | We set it, as the school tells us |
A care contact talks to the student off Thnkrr, the way a school counsellor normally would. They get no way to message the student on Thnkrr. Someone who leaves the school loses these duties automatically.
The Thnkrr safety team
These are our own people, not school staff. They don't use Thnkrr like a student or mentor. When they sign in they see only a list of things to review. Each person wears one or more "hats", and each hat sees only its own work:
| Hat | What it handles |
|---|---|
| Moderator | Posts and messages our checks or members pointed out, appeals, care referrals |
| Child safety lead | Child-safety cases, private sexual images shared without consent, reports to child-protection bodies and police |
| Grievance officer | The person Indian law requires us to name, who handles public complaints and court or government orders |
| Safety admin | Sees every list without acting on it; decides who wears which hat |
They can hide or remove content, keep evidence, and suspend or ban an account. Every action is logged with their name. Every hat has a backup person. When an item gets close to its legal deadline, the hat and its backup get an email.
Visitors who aren't signed in
On thnkrr.com a visitor sees the landing page and can join the waitlist. If someone shares a profile link, a visitor can open the profile of anyone 18 or over who has chosen to let people outside Thnkrr see it. That includes mentors, teachers and students who are 18. They never see a student under 18, and search engines never list one.
A person's journey, start to finish
This is the path for everyone who signs up: students, mentors and teachers. Parents, our safety team and visitors don't follow it.
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| 1. Hears about Thnkrr | Joins the waitlist on thnkrr.com |
| 2. Is let in | Sign-up is invite-only on the live site; we open it for them |
| 3. Signs up | Picks student, mentor or teacher, gives date of birth, school and email |
| 4. Proves their email | Clicks the link we send |
| 5. Gets confirmed | See below |
| 6. Parent approves | Under-18 students only, after the school's check |
| 7. Uses Thnkrr | As described for their role above |
| 8. Life changes | Moves school, turns 18, or a teacher leaves the school |
| 9. Something goes wrong | Content hidden; account suspended for a while or banned; they can appeal |
| 10. Leaves | Closes the account, or we close it, or after 3 years unused |
| 11. Is deleted | 30 days after closing, unless the law makes us keep it |
Confirming works differently for each role. A student is confirmed as being at the school straight away if they use their school email; otherwise a teacher confirms them from the class list. For students under 18, the school's parent checker still checks their age and guardian before any parent email goes out. A mentor is confirmed by proving their college email; if their college isn't on our list yet, they can carry on but show as not confirmed. A teacher is confirmed by proving their school staff email; a teacher on a personal email has nobody who can confirm them yet, and gets none of the teacher tools.
Before an unused account closes, we email them 30 days and 7 days ahead. If a student's school isn't on Thnkrr yet, their sign-up stops there and we keep only the school's name so we can contact the school.
Two things in this journey aren't built yet. First, nothing happens when a student finishes high school. The account stays a student account. Second, a student can't become a mentor later, because a role is fixed for life and only our team can change it by hand.
What Thnkrr doesn't have today
To avoid assuming any of these exist:
- Any role for professors, college admissions staff or other college employees.
- Any account for parents.
- Networking for any adult. Teachers and mentors can't post, connect or have a feed.
- Graduation or alumni: what a student becomes after high school.
- Any way for a mentor, teacher or other adult to reach a student first on Thnkrr.
- Background checks for mentors. Not decided yet.
- Chat between mentors and students, which is built but switched off for now.
- Tools for a school or college to post jobs, events, courses or programs.
- Anyone at a college who can run its page. We can set up a page for a college the same way we do for a school, but no college staff can sign in to run it.
For you to fill in: adding a new kind of person
Please answer these for each new kind of person you want on Thnkrr. Write your answers under each question in this file, or reply in a message, whichever is easier. A few sentences each is plenty, and "not sure yet" is a fine answer. Professors are the first one, below. Copy the blank block for any other role.
The questions about contact matter most. Today no mentor or teacher can reach a student first on Thnkrr. Every new adult role has to fit that rule, or come with a clear reason and new safety checks.
Professors (please fill in)
1. Who exactly are they? How many have asked so far, from which colleges and countries, and what did they say they want? Full-time faculty only, or also admissions and outreach staff?
2. Why do they want to be on Thnkrr? What are they hoping to get from it?
3. What do students get from them being here?
4. What should they be able to do? For example: post, answer questions in public, run a college page, talk one-to-one with students who ask, list programs or summer schools.
5. Who can they reach, and who can reach them? Can they only reply to students who ask first, like mentors? Should they ever see a list of students, or search for students? Should any of this be different for students who are 18 or over?
6. What must they never be able to do or see?
7. How do they get in, and who vouches for them? For example: we invite them, their college confirms them, or they prove a college staff email.
8. Do they belong to one college, and should that college have a page? Who runs it?
9. What happens when they leave the college?
Blank copy for another role
Role name:
1. Who exactly are they?
2. Why do they want to be on Thnkrr?
3. What do students get from them being here?
4. What should they be able to do?
5. Who can they reach, and who can reach them?
6. What must they never be able to do or see?
7. How do they get in, and who vouches for them?
8. Do they belong to one school or college, and should it have a page? Who runs it?
9. What happens when they leave?