Gesso Lite
Erase your Canvas.
Gesso was built on a simple premise: the tools we use to teach should serve teaching, not surveil it. No behavioral tracking. No data brokering. No third-party monetization. Just a clean surface for the work of learning.
What it does
Multi-stage assignments
Each assignment can have any number of stages — outline, draft, revision, final — with its own due date. Late submissions are flagged automatically.
Bulk download & return
Pull every student's draft as a single zip. Mark them up. Upload them back as one zip and they're routed automatically by filename to each student.
Course readings
Upload PDFs once, students download as needed. No syllabus-attachment-by-email.
Roster management
Add students by email. They register themselves; only whitelisted addresses can sign up.
Course templates
Save a course's structure as a reusable template. Teach the same class next year without retyping every assignment.
Right to be forgotten
When a course is over, delete it. Submissions, files, accounts — all of it. A backup zip downloads first; nothing lingers on the server.
Roles
Instructor
- Create and manage courses
- Build multi-stage assignments
- View all submissions
- Return marked work
- Manage course readings
- Save courses as templates
- Delete courses entirely
Tutor
- View student submissions
- Download student work
- Read course readings
Student
- Submit drafts by stage
- Resubmit before deadline
- Download returned work
- Access course readings
Built with
Next.js 16
App Router, server components
Supabase
Postgres, Auth, Storage
Tailwind CSS v4
Utility-first styling
TypeScript
End-to-end typing
Vercel
Deployment
JSZip
Bulk file handling
Why a Lite version?
The full Gesso supports multiple instructors, announcements, markdown syllabi, and the rich machinery a department needs. Gesso Lite is the same idea reduced to one teacher's workflow: the bones of a course, no extra weight.
If you teach writing — drafts, comments, revisions — and want a tool you can run yourself for a few classes a year without ever having a meeting about features, this is for you.