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Clema vs AskK12 for school and district websites

Both answer family questions from your own website and cite the page. AskK12 is a shipping product with published pricing. Clema's website assistant is in early access. Here is how they differ today.

The short version

AskK12 is an available, priced product built for districts: a published starting price of $1,500 a year, a 60-day pilot, answers in 25+ languages, Q&A your staff writes that takes priority, community insights with exportable reports, banner alerts and a published VPAT for the widget. Clema's website assistant is early access. Its engine reads a district's pages and documents (PDFs, Office files, calendars), pulls out contacts, events and deadlines, cites the source for each factual answer and says when the site does not cover a question, and it has been proven on one U.S. K-12 district. If you need a priced, multilingual chatbot live this semester, AskK12 is ahead. If you want to shape an assistant that is built around your documents and calendars, and you are comfortable with early access, talk to Clema.

Last reviewed November 2026

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What AskK12 is

AskK12 is an AI chatbot for K-12 district websites, from CongratsGrad, LLC. It answers parent questions from the district website and from Q&A the district writes, with cited sources.1,2

Clema is an early-access website assistant: it reads your public site and answers visitors with a link to the page behind each answer.

At a glance

Each AskK12 cell links to the public page it came from. Each Clema cell shows where that feature stands today.

Website assistant

  • Answers from the district website

    AskK12
    Answers come from Q&A the district writes and, for everything else, from the district's own website content. The features page says "AI reads every page."4,2vendor claim
    Clema
    BuiltCrawls the whole site plus PDFs, Office files and calendars. Proven on one K-12 district; very long PDFs are read from the start, not in full.

  • Cited sources in answers

    AskK12
    "Source-Cited Answers": every answer links back to the page it came from.2vendor claim
    Clema
    BuiltEach factual answer links to the page or document it came from, shown as source chips in the widget.

  • Staff-written priority answers

    AskK12
    Districts write answers for the topics that matter most and the AI cannot override them.4,2
    Clema
    Not availableNot available yet. Today you fix an answer by fixing the page it came from.

  • When the site does not cover a question

    AskK12
    Says so with a fallback message the district can customize, and routes to a staff contact if one is set up.4
    Clema
    BuiltRuns a self-check before answering and says when the site does not cover the question.

  • Contacts, events and deadlines

    AskK12
    Not found on public pages
    Clema
    BuiltPulls typed contacts, dated events, deadlines, fees and hours out of pages and documents, so an answer can give the office, phone number or date your site lists.

  • Languages

    AskK12
    25+ languages with automatic detection.3,2vendor claim
    Clema
    Not availableAnswers in English today. Spanish is the first language on the roadmap.

  • Content freshness and re-crawl schedule

    AskK12
    Crawled content is re-crawled on a schedule the district sets (manual, daily or weekly).5
    Clema
    In developmentRe-crawl scheduling is in development.

  • Visitor feedback on answers

    AskK12
    Visitors can rate answers helpful or not helpful.5
    Clema
    In developmentAnswer ratings from visitors are in development.

  • Banner alerts

    AskK12
    Push a banner alert to every visitor on demand.2vendor claim
    Clema
    Not availableNot available yet.

  • Question insights and unanswered questions

    AskK12
    "Community Insights" with exportable reports showing what parents ask and what goes unanswered.2,3vendor claim
    Clema
    In developmentUnanswered questions are logged in the engine. The report and analytics screens are in development.

Lead capture

  • Collecting family details in chat

    AskK12
    Does not ask visitors for personal information; chatbot interactions are anonymous.4,5
    Clema
    Not availableNot available yet. Inquiry capture is in development for the college product; a K-12 version is not specified.

  • Connection to SIS, CRM or internal systems

    AskK12
    Runs on AskK12's servers from one embed script and does not connect to internal systems.4
    Clema
    Not availableAnswers from public website content, with no student-record access by design. No SIS or CRM connection.

Help desk

  • Routing to the right staff contact

    AskK12
    Routes parents to the right contact when it cannot answer, using contact routes the district sets up.2,4vendor claim
    Clema
    In developmentOffice contacts and hours are already extracted. Automatic routing to the right office is in development.

  • Live chat or handoff to a person

    AskK12
    No live chat described. When it cannot answer it connects the visitor to a staff contact the district sets up.4
    Clema
    Not availableNot available yet.

  • Tickets or a staff case queue

    AskK12
    Not found on public pages
    Clema
    Not availableNot available. An "ask a person" email or phone escalation is in development.

  • Staff review of conversations

    AskK12
    Authorized district administrators review retained conversations in an admin dashboard.5
    Clema
    In developmentConversations are stored, but there is no admin dashboard yet. It is in development.

Setup and pricing

  • Published pricing

    AskK12
    Starting at $1,500 a year, quoted by district enrollment. No usage fees and no per-message charges.3
    Clema
    Not availableNo published pricing. The website assistant is in early access; talk to the team.

  • Pilot or trial

    AskK12
    60-day pilot included, with no payment information required to start.3
    Clema
    Not availableEarly access by conversation with the team. No self-serve trial.

  • Setup

    AskK12
    Most districts live within 24 hours. AskK12 handles the crawl, first Q&A setup, embed code and a staff walkthrough.4,3vendor claim
    Clema
    BuiltBuilt: the Clema team crawls and sets up your site with you. Self-serve setup is in development.

  • Embed and branding

    AskK12
    One line of code with your district branding. No IT project.2vendor claim
    Clema
    Demo-gradeA short script embed with your name, colors and starter questions. Demo-grade, not yet production.

Data and compliance

  • Student records and FERPA

    AskK12
    Describes itself as "FERPA-aligned by design" and does not collect, store or process student education records.4,5vendor claim
    Clema
    BuiltFERPA-aware design with no student-record access. No certification or audit for this product.

  • AI provider disclosure

    AskK12
    Uses OpenAI's API for questions not covered by district Q&A and lists its subprocessors (Neon, OpenAI, Zoho Mail, Replit).5
    Clema
    BuiltUses OpenAI models for search embeddings and answers, and says so.

  • Retention and deletion

    AskK12
    Conversations kept for a district-configured period (default 90 days), then deleted. Admins can delete history in the dashboard.5
    Clema
    In developmentRetention and deletion controls are in development.

  • Accessibility

    AskK12
    Chat widget built to meet WCAG 2.1 AA, with a published VPAT (October 2026) covering the widget.6,2vendor claim
    Clema
    Not availableThe widget dialog is partly accessible. No accessibility audit or VPAT yet.

Where AskK12 is ahead today

  • Published price: from $1,500 a year, quoted by enrollment, with no usage fees.3
  • A 60-day pilot with no payment information required.3
  • Answers in 25+ languages with automatic detection.3,2vendor claim
  • Staff-written answers that always come first and that the AI cannot override.4
  • Banner alerts pushed to every visitor on demand.2vendor claim
  • Content is re-crawled on a schedule the district sets (manual, daily or weekly).5
  • When it cannot answer, it shows a configurable fallback message and connects the visitor to the right staff contact the district has set up. Clema's routing is in development.4
  • A stated privacy posture: chats are anonymous, the public widget uses no cookies, and conversation data is not used to train or fine-tune models.5
  • Visitor helpful and not-helpful ratings on answers.5
  • Published abuse controls: rate limiting on the public chatbot, daily message limits and prompt-injection guards.5
  • Community insights with exportable reports on what families ask and what goes unanswered.2,3vendor claim
  • An admin dashboard with configurable retention (default 90 days) and deletion.5
  • A published WCAG 2.1 AA statement and VPAT for the chat widget.6vendor claim

Where Clema differs

Built

Reads documents and calendars, not just pages

The engine crawls the site and the files linked from it: PDFs, Word, Excel and PowerPoint files, and calendar feeds. Handbooks, board packets and calendars become part of what it can answer from. Image-only PDFs cannot be read yet. Very long PDFs are read from the start, not in full yet.

Built

Pulls out the facts families ask about

Contacts, dated events, deadlines, fees and hours are extracted as structured records, so an answer can give the office, phone number or date your site lists instead of a paragraph to dig through.

Built

Checks itself before it answers

A self-check runs before each answer, and every factual answer cites the page or document it used. Both products tell visitors when the site does not cover a question.

Built

Built by the team behind Clema for IR

Clema already helps institutional research teams answer data questions. The website assistant is a newer, early-access product from the same team, and you can help shape it.

Which one fits

Choose AskK12 if

  • You want a priced product with a published starting price and a 60-day pilot.
  • Families on your site need answers in Spanish or other home languages now.
  • Your staff wants to write official answers that always win over crawled text.
  • You need a VPAT for the widget, an admin dashboard and configurable retention today.
  • You want banner alerts and question insights out of the box.

Choose Clema if

  • Much of what families ask lives in PDFs, handbooks and calendars rather than web pages.
  • You want an answer to give the office, phone number or date your site lists, with the source cited.
  • You are comfortable with early access and want a say in how the assistant develops.

Using both

These products do the same job on the same page, so most districts would run one assistant, not both. If you are evaluating, ask each vendor to answer the same 20 real parent questions from your site, including a few that live in PDFs or calendars, and compare the answers and citations side by side.

Clema vs AskK12: common questions

AskK12 publishes a starting price of $1,500 a year, quoted by district enrollment, with no usage fees and a 60-day pilot. Clema has not published pricing for the website assistant. It is in early access, so pricing is discussed with the team.

Sources

Every statement about another product links to one of these pages.

  1. 1.AskK12: homepage, accessed 2026-11-06
  2. 2.AskK12: features, accessed 2026-11-06
  3. 3.AskK12: pricing, accessed 2026-11-06
  4. 4.AskK12: FAQ, accessed 2026-11-06
  5. 5.AskK12: privacy policy, accessed 2026-11-06
  6. 6.AskK12: accessibility statement and VPAT, accessed 2026-11-06

Competitor details come from their public pages on the date shown. Product names are trademarks of their owners. Spot something out of date? Email us at [email protected].

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