This document covers technology requirements for creating curriculum for the iMentor Platform. Out of scope are questions about how the curriculum relates to the program model.

Bandwidth

While many schools and organizations have internet connectivity that exceeds levels necessary to run the Platform, some schools or classrooms may have temporary or even ongoing issues with bandwidth. “It is important that curriculum designers adhere to the best practices below to ensure that the content you create does not require too much bandwidth, which can impact the ability of students to load lessons.

• Do not use PNG files; use JPG for images. Images should be less than ~100K in size.
• Make documents less than 10 pages. Large documents should be split into smaller documents by lesson, unless there is a specific reason that it needs to be larger.
• All lessons need to be tested using the baseline bandwidth level specified in the iMentor Platform Technology Requirements, and the supported browsers. To simulate bandwidth availability for one machine, please see the following instructions:
  • Chrome
  • Edge
  • For Safari, install Apple’s “Additional Tools for Xcode,” and use the Network Line Conditioner

Embedded Content

Embedded content from other sites needs to be public domain, or fair use (17 U.S.C. §107). Because access to content hosted on other sites can change, the content must be transferred to iMentor owned locations.

• Embedded documents need be Google documents or PDFs, for display purposes
• Documents from other websites need be stored locally in iMentor’s Google drive account, so the links will not be invalidated if the website of origin takes down content
• Videos (e.g. Vimeo), need to be stored locally in iMentor’s video account, so the links will not be invalidated if the website of origin takes down content

Additional Considerations

• Do not use URL shortener websites, such as bit.ly or goo.gl; these websites can go down, which introduces another reliability factor (e.g. goo.gl is no longer supported by Google, although old links still work)
• When creating lessons for the beginning of a school year, please remember that mentees receive a new copy of a document when matched with a new mentor; the new mentor will not automatically see any documents prior to their being matched with the mentee