Walnut Institute Terms of Service

1. Eligibility and Accounts

1.1 Eligibility

You must be legally capable of entering this agreement where you live. Otherwise, you may use the Services only with authorization from a parent, guardian, or organization that can accept these Terms and take responsibility for your use.

1.2 Registration and security

You must provide accurate information, keep it current, protect your credentials, and promptly notify support@walnutinstitute.com if you suspect unauthorized access. You are responsible for activity through your account except to the extent caused by Walnut.

Features and permissions differ for learners, instructors, and administrators. You may not use another person's account or role without authorization.

2. The Services

Walnut provides an online learning platform that includes course discovery and enrollment, lessons and downloadable resources, notes, quizzes and grading, progress and completion tracking, ratings, badges and certificates where offered, account notifications, and AI-assisted learning and course-administration tools.

Some courses may have prerequisites, sequential lesson requirements, attempt limits, passing scores, enrollment limits, or access dates shown in the course or at enrollment. Certificates acknowledge completion within Walnut; they are not an accredited degree, professional licence, or guarantee of acceptance by an employer or institution unless Walnut expressly states otherwise.

We may improve, modify, suspend, or discontinue features. If a material change affects a paid service, any mandatory rights under applicable consumer law remain available.

3. Course Access and Learning Records

Enrollment gives you a limited right to access the applicable course for personal learning, or authorized internal organizational learning, during the access period displayed for that course. Access is not transferable.

Walnut records enrollment, lesson and quiz progress, attempts, answers, scores, notes, badges, ratings, and certificates to deliver the Services. Instructors and administrators with appropriate permissions may review learning activity and submissions for teaching, grading, support, integrity, and service administration.

Certificate verification may be publicly accessible using a certificate identifier and may display the learner's name, course, completion date, and certificate status. Account controls allow a learner to hide or re-enable public certificate verification.

4. Prices, Payments, and Refunds

4.1 Purchases

Course purchases are one-time purchases, not subscriptions. Current checkout prices are shown in U.S. dollars. Some courses may offer an adjustable price within limits shown at checkout. Your order summary identifies the course, amount, and total before you proceed to Stripe Checkout.

4.2 Stripe

Stripe processes paid transactions. Stripe's terms and privacy practices also apply to its services. If you choose to save a card in your Wallet, Stripe stores the payment method for future purchases; saving a card does not authorize recurring charges. Walnut does not receive or store the full card number or security code.

4.3 Confirmation and taxes

After a successful payment, Walnut records the purchase, enrolls the purchaser, and provides an electronic confirmation or receipt. Any tax Walnut charges will be included in the amount shown before payment.

4.4 Cancellations, refunds, and billing problems

Walnut does not currently offer a separate general discretionary refund guarantee. Refund or cancellation rights apply where required by law or expressly stated in a written offer or at purchase. This section does not limit statutory rights.

For a duplicate or unauthorized charge, billing error, or a material inability to access purchased content, contact support@walnutinstitute.com with the account email, course, purchase date, receipt if available, and an explanation. If a refund is approved or legally required, it will ordinarily be returned through the original payment method, and related course access may be removed.

4.5 Payment disputes

We may temporarily restrict access associated with a disputed payment while we investigate. Fraudulent or abusive chargebacks may result in suspension or termination, subject to applicable law.

5. Intellectual Property and Course Licence

The Services, platform software, design, branding, and Walnut-created content belong to Walnut or its licensors and are protected by intellectual property laws. Instructor or third-party course materials may belong to their respective owners.

Subject to these Terms, Walnut grants you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to access the Services and enrolled content for your own learning or authorized internal organizational use. Access is licensed, not sold.

You may download a resource only when the Service enables downloading. You may not publicly share, republish, sell, sublicense, commercially exploit, remove attribution from, or distribute course materials to unauthorized persons, nor create distributable derivative works without permission.

If you provide ideas or feedback, you permit Walnut to use them without restriction or compensation, but this does not give Walnut ownership of your other User Content.

6. User Content

“User Content” includes information and material you submit through the Services, such as profile details and avatars, notes, quiz responses, ratings and comments, AI tutor messages, contact or inquiry submissions, and course materials or media uploaded by authorized instructors or administrators.

As between you and Walnut, you retain ownership of your User Content. You grant Walnut a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, reproduce, process, transmit, and display it only as reasonably necessary to provide, secure, support, administer, and comply with law in relation to the Services. This licence ends when the content is deleted, except for reasonable backup cycles and content Walnut must retain by law or for legitimate disputes, security, or enforcement.

You represent that you have the rights and permissions needed to submit User Content and that it does not violate law or third-party rights. Do not upload malware, confidential material you are not authorized to share, or another person's personal information without authority.

Walnut may remove or restrict User Content that violates these Terms, creates legal or security risk, or is no longer needed to operate the Services. We are not a permanent storage or backup service.

7. AI Features and AI-Assisted Grading

7.1 How AI is used

Walnut uses third-party AI services to provide the AI tutor, retrieve relevant course material, grade certain written or flexible-answer quiz responses, and help authorized administrators draft courses. The specific processing is described in the Privacy Policy.

7.2 AI output can be wrong

AI output may be inaccurate, incomplete, biased, misleading, or out of date. Verify important information and do not treat AI output as medical, legal, financial, or other professional advice.

7.3 Grading

AI-assisted grading may affect quiz scores, pass status, course progress, and completion. Walnut identifies AI-assisted grading before a relevant quiz begins. If you believe AI grading is incorrect, contact support@walnutinstitute.com to request review. Walnut may correct a grade or learning record after review.

7.4 Your responsibilities

Do not submit sensitive personal information to AI Features unless necessary and authorized. You may not attempt to extract confidential prompts or data, bypass safeguards, interfere with models or systems, use AI Features unlawfully, infringe rights, or misrepresent AI-generated work contrary to applicable academic rules.

7.5 Ownership and use

Your rights in prompts and AI output are subject to applicable law, these Terms, and any third-party rights. Similar or identical AI output may be provided to others. Walnut does not guarantee that AI output is unique, protectable, or non-infringing.

8. Acceptable Use

You must not:

• break the law, violate rights, impersonate others, or misrepresent your authority;
• harass, threaten, exploit, discriminate against, or harm another person;
• submit unlawful, abusive, hateful, pornographic, fraudulent, or infringing material;
• upload malware or attempt unauthorized access, vulnerability testing, scraping, denial-of-service, or circumvention of security, access, payment, or rate-limit controls;
• use automated tools to access the Services without written authorization;
• reverse engineer the Services except where the law prohibits that restriction; or
• cheat, plagiarize, or use the Services to misrepresent work in violation of applicable academic or organizational rules.

9. Communications

Walnut may send operational communications needed to provide the Services, including email verification, password reset, purchase confirmation, security, course access, and account or service notices. Authorized administrators may also send course-related notifications or emails to enrolled learners.

If Walnut introduces promotional electronic messages, it will request and record consent where required, identify the sender, provide an unsubscribe mechanism, and continue sending only communications that applicable law permits after an unsubscribe. Account preferences do not prevent essential security, legal, or transactional messages.

10. Third-Party Services

Walnut relies on service providers for hosting and databases, cloud storage and content delivery, email delivery, payment processing, bot and abuse prevention, AI services, and background job processing. Third-party services may have separate terms and privacy notices. Walnut is not responsible for a provider's independent service, outage, or conduct, but this does not remove responsibilities Walnut cannot exclude by law.

11. Privacy and Cookies

The Privacy Policy explains Walnut's personal-information practices. The Cookie Policy lists the cookies and browser storage currently used. If these Terms conflict with the Privacy Policy about handling personal information, the Privacy Policy governs that issue.

12. Suspension, Account Closure, and Termination

You may stop using the Services at any time and may request account deletion as described in the Privacy Policy. Account deletion can end course access and may affect access to learning records and certificates.

Walnut may restrict, suspend, or terminate an account when reasonably necessary for a Terms violation, fraud or non-payment, academic abuse, infringement, security risk, unlawful conduct, harm to users or Walnut, or legal compliance. Where reasonable, we will provide notice and an opportunity to address the issue.

On termination, your right to use the Services ends. Purchased access may be removed for serious fraud, piracy, abuse, or other material breach to the extent permitted by law. Provisions that by their nature should survive will survive, including intellectual property, payment obligations, disclaimers, liability limits, indemnity, and dispute terms.

13. Disclaimers

To the fullest extent permitted by law, the Services and content are provided “as is” and “as available.” Walnut does not guarantee uninterrupted or error-free operation; that content or AI output will be complete, accurate, or suitable for a particular purpose; or that a course, score, badge, or certificate will result in employment, accreditation, credential acceptance, or another outcome.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Walnut disclaims implied warranties, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, and warranties arising from course of dealing. Some jurisdictions do not permit certain exclusions, so they apply only to the extent legally permitted.

14. Limitation of Liability

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Walnut and its directors, officers, employees, contractors, and affiliates will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for loss of profits, revenue, data, goodwill, opportunity, or business interruption arising from the Services.

To the fullest extent permitted by law, Walnut's aggregate liability for claims relating to the Services will not exceed the greater of (a) the amount you paid Walnut for the Services giving rise to the claim during the 12 months before the event, or (b) CAD $50.

These exclusions and limits do not apply where prohibited, including liability that cannot legally be excluded or limited and rights available under applicable consumer-protection law.

15. Indemnity

To the extent permitted by law, you will indemnify and hold harmless Walnut and its directors, officers, employees, contractors, and affiliates from third-party claims, damages, and reasonable costs arising from your unlawful use of the Services, material breach of these Terms, or User Content that infringes another person's rights. This obligation does not apply to the extent a claim results from Walnut's own conduct.

16. Governing Law and Disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of Ontario and the federal laws of Canada applicable there, without regard to conflict-of-law rules. Subject to rights you cannot waive under applicable law, disputes will be brought before the courts located in Ontario, Canada.

Before filing a claim, please contact support@walnutinstitute.com and provide enough detail for both sides to try to resolve it informally.

17. Changes to These Terms

We may update these Terms to reflect changes in the Services, law, or our practices. We will update the date above and provide additional notice when a change is material or when law requires it. If material changes require renewed agreement, Walnut will request it before continued use. Changes do not retroactively reduce accrued rights.

18. General

These Terms and the policies linked above are the entire agreement about the Services unless a separate written agreement applies. If a provision is unenforceable, it will be limited or severed while the rest remains effective. Failure to enforce a provision is not a waiver. You may not assign these Terms without Walnut's consent; Walnut may assign them as part of a reorganization, financing, merger, acquisition, or sale of assets, subject to law.

19. Contact

Questions about these Terms: support@walnutinstitute.com

Privacy questions or requests: privacy@walnutinstitute.com