A group of Dallas-based educators came to App Vertices with a clear gap in the market: students were already collaborating daily on social platforms, but none of those spaces were built for academic collaboration. At the same time, traditional school portals and LMS tools felt outdated, rigid, and disengaging.
They didn’t want another learning management system — they wanted a platform students would actually use.
The goal was to design and develop a Texas-centered academic social platform that:
App Vertices approached LoneStar Circle by focusing on student behavior first, not just features. We mapped how Texas high school and college students naturally interact online — short-form content, threaded discussions, reactions, ranking signals — and then layered educational structure on top of those patterns.
We engineered the platform to support large-scale usage with school-verified onboarding, role-based permissions, and moderation tools that remain powerful behind the scenes while keeping the user experience smooth and social.
LoneStar Circle launched as a social-style academic platform that successfully bridged the gap between student engagement and structured learning. Within months, it gained traction across multiple Texas districts, with educators reporting stronger peer collaboration and increased participation — especially from students who previously avoided traditional LMS systems.
