Compass and AI.

The plans

Compass is a cloud-based school management system developed in Australia.^25,5

The company, Compass Education Pty Ltd, has its registered office in Hawthorn, Victoria.¹¹

• Compass says it was founded in 2010 and now supports “5,000+ schools and 5M users”.²
• Its PCI DSS page says it works “with over 1,800 schools in Australia”.²⁵
• Compass says it’s Department of Education approved in NSW, Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania and WA.³
• It says more than 700 Catholic schools use it through a partnership with CEnet.⁴
• Independent schools can buy Compass Private, which Compass calls “Compass’s bespoke solution” for independent schools.⁵
• In WA, Compass announced in August 2023 that it had won the tender to supply school management software to more than 800 public schools.²⁴
• Compass says it’s hosted “from Australia-based data centres”.⁶
• It lists ISO 27001 and PCI DSS Level 1 among its security credentials.^2,25
• We found no prices on Compass’s website. It offers demos and an information pack instead.¹

Sources for the table:^{1,5,8,9,17,21,22}

• Compass AI sits on top of CompassOS, which Compass describes as the layer that joins its products under one login. CompassOS is “currently in a pilot phase with a small number of schools”.⁸
• The Compass AI page invites schools to register interest. It gives no release date or price.⁸
• Compass’s features page groups its modules into five areas: leadership and administration, wellbeing, school community, learning management, and finance.⁷

What’s built in

Jobs it’s good for

• One student’s attendance. Ask “Show me Harry Smith’s attendance for the current term and flag any unapproved absences.” That’s one of Compass’s own examples.⁹
• A year level at a glance. The cohort attendance tool lists each student’s class percentage, so you can ask which Year 8 students are below 80%.⁹
• What’s due. Ask what a student has due in the next fortnight across all subjects.⁹
• When a class meets. Ask when Year 11 Business Management next meets and who’s rostered.⁹
• This week’s Chronicle. List the Chronicle entries logged this week for Year 9, grouped by category. The list tools return structured fields without the free-text body.⁹
• Calendar sums. Ask how many teaching days are in a month, or when Term 2 starts.⁹
• ”How do I” questions. Ask Susie inside Compass.¹⁷
• Elective lines. Timetablers can let Griddle’s AI build the lines, then adjust them by hand.²²

What to watch for

Student data leaves Compass

• When the connector runs, “your Compass data passes through the AI provider’s infrastructure”.¹⁰
• Compass doesn’t control how the provider keeps it, so read that provider’s privacy policy before you connect.¹⁰
• Compass recommends schools “consult with their privacy officer or legal adviser before enabling any AI integration”.¹⁰
• It also asks administrators to review their obligations under “applicable state and federal privacy legislation” before staff use the connector with student data.¹⁰

Not every sensitive detail is filtered

• Medical, access-restriction and contact details are stripped.⁹
• The full Chronicle entry tool is “unredacted by design”, and attendance notes can include health or pastoral comments.⁹
• Chronicle entries and attendance notes are free text that people type. Text like that could carry instructions aimed at the AI. That’s our inference, based on Anthropic’s warning about hidden instructions.³⁰

The login sets the limit

• The assistant sees only what your Compass role can see.⁹
• So an administrator’s login exposes everything that administrator can see. That’s our inference from the above.

Personal AI accounts

• On Claude’s Free, Pro and Max plans, chats can be used for training if you allow it. Raw connector content is left out unless it’s copied into the chat.³¹
• Claude’s work plans aren’t used for training by default.³²
• Compass leaves the choice of AI provider to the school. Our reading: student data belongs in an account your school has approved and manages.¹⁰

Department schools

• Compass won the WA Department of Education’s tender to supply more than 800 public schools.²⁴
• Compass says the connector needs approval from “the user’s school or education authority”. Our reading: in a department school, check with the department before you connect.¹⁰

Menu names differ

• Compass’s page says Settings › Connectors in Claude. Anthropic’s current docs say Customize > Connectors.^9,29
• Compass’s Gemini Enterprise menu path doesn’t match Google’s own guide.^9,38

Cost

• Compass hasn’t published a price for Compass AI.⁸
• Claude’s Free plan allows one custom connector.³⁰
• Gemini Enterprise is a separate Google Cloud product. We didn’t research its price.³⁸

Who switches what

• Your Compass account manager: the Compass AI feature.⁹
• Your school or education authority: which AI providers are approved.¹⁰
• School administrators: user permissions, and removing a person’s MCP access.¹⁰
• Claude Team and Enterprise Owners: adding the custom connector for the organisation.²⁹
• Your Google Workspace administrator: the Gemini Enterprise connector, and which staff groups get it.⁹

Check the answers

• Compass says a “no results” answer is “usually a scope or phrasing mismatch”. Ask again and name the year level, dates or student.⁹

Logins and AI browser agents

• Compass’s terms forbid shared logins and third-party integration through the platform, and Compass watches for bots.¹²
• Our reading: use the connector your school has approved, and don’t give any AI tool your Compass password. This isn’t legal advice.

What’s changing

• 24 April 2025: Susie launched.¹⁷
• 14 May 2026: the last change to Compass’s AI/MCP privacy addendum, according to the page’s details.¹⁰
• 9 June 2026: the Compass OS and Compass AI register-interest page went up. It was updated on 13 July 2026.⁸
• CompassOS: in a pilot with a small number of schools. Compass plans a phased rollout and says it will eventually be on for every school, with no opt-out once it’s generally available.⁸
• Coming, no date: a Compass listing in Anthropic’s Connectors Directory, so Claude users can add it without pasting the URL.⁹
• July 2026 (UK): Compass said its AI features are “soon to be released in the UK”, to help schools pull inspection evidence with plain-language questions.¹⁹

What we couldn’t establish

• Compass AI’s price, and which contracts include it.^8,9
• When Compass AI became available to Australian schools. The page asks for interest and gives no date.⁸
• ChatGPT and Copilot. Compass names them as examples but documents no setup, so we couldn’t confirm either works with the connector.^10,9
• Where the connector runs. Compass says schools are hosted in Australian data centres, but doesn’t say which country the connector’s servers are in.^6,10
• Sign-in permissions. The addendum says access depends on “the permissions you grant during the OAuth authorisation flow”. The connector’s public sign-in settings list a single permission, called “compass”. We couldn’t see the sign-in screen itself.^10,16
• The Compass account setting. The addendum says you can revoke permissions in “your Compass account settings”. The setup page doesn’t describe that setting.^10,9
• What powers Susie, and what happens to the questions you type.¹⁷
• Whether Australian schools also have Terry, or whether Terry and Susie are the same service.^17,18
• How Griddle’s AI uses school data.^21,22
• The 2024 AI security monitoring. One blog post mentions it, and we found no detail.²⁷
• Compass’s own help articles. Its public Help Centre shows only parent videos and a parent guide, so we couldn’t read staff help on AI.²⁶
• Gemini Enterprise sign-in details. Google’s guide asks for OAuth details such as a client ID. Compass’s page only says to “Confirm the OAuth handshake”.^38,9
• Dates on Compass’s policies. The privacy policy and the addendum show no date on the page itself. We took their dates from the pages’ details.^11,10
• OpenAI’s in-app plugin directory needs a login, so we checked OpenAI’s public plugin pages only.³⁴