Relaunch of an Online SAT/ACT Prep School
Webium
In 2021, Webium was running on a Ruby system built by outsourced contractors. They came to us with a classic issue: the contractors were dragging their feet on new features.
After reviewing the code and team capabilities, we realized refactoring the existing system would be slow and costly. Instead, we opted to rebuild from scratch using our go-to stack—Django and Nuxt.js. We nailed it in a year: by September 2022, all students were buying and taking courses on the new platform.
Challenges
- Ensure business-requested features are delivered on predictable timelines. Extreme example: “Let’s add this tiny thing; sure, it’ll be done tomorrow” (two weeks later), “Oops, it’ll take six months” (and that’s if they’re honest).
- Hire a CTO and build an in-house dev team to ditch reliance on outsourcing.
- Pull this off without pausing classes or hurting the business.
Webium’s Homepage — The Online School That Needed a Fun Relaunch
Главная страница Вебиума — онлайн-школы, которую ждал нескучный перезапуск
Split the Work into Two Big Phases
Launch of the New Store
The part of the site where students and parents buy courses.
Launch of the New Learning Platform
The Learning Management System (LMS) where students watch webinars, access materials, complete assignments, and chat with mentors.
Webium’s Homepage — The Online School That Needed a Fun Relaunch
Part One: Store Relaunch
6 months
The store relaunch gave the business two big wins: a shopping cart and clear analytics. The old Webium had a major limitation: one course = one purchase. Bad for business, bad for students.
What we needed to do:
- Build a user-friendly cart allowing bulk course purchases with discounts.
- Create a data structure that doesn’t make developers want to quit.
Architecture
We set up separate databases for each system. Here’s a snippet of the functional diagram for adding items to the cart with discounts applied.
This is what the cart looks like in the new store.
For traffic routing, we used a combo of Traefik and Express.js. Express.js acts as a Backend for Frontend (BFF). Here’s the traffic routing diagram using an Express.js proxy.
The diagram shows three types of requests:
- privacy-policy (yellow): A static page from the new store. Express.js handles the request and returns the result to the client.
- api/v2/courses (blue): A request to the new backend. It’s proxied to the Python backend, and the result is sent to the client.
- certificates (red): — A page from the LMS. The Express.js app doesn’t recognize this path, so the request is proxied to the Ruby app, and the result is returned.
Store Launch
We planned rollback meticulously: pre-filled all sales data in both the new store and the old system. We set up feature flags —environment variables that could instantly revert to the old system if needed.
Not a single user faced payment issues during the switch. Everyone who wanted to pay Webium got it done. We’re pretty proud of that.
Part Two: LMS Relaunch
7 месяцев
The goal: relaunch the LMS—the platform where students watch webinars, do assignments, and interact with mentors.
We also had to overhaul the admin panel for staff.
We also had to overhaul the admin panel for staff.
The student-mentor chat interface allows discussions for each completed assignment. The LMS admin panel serves multiple roles: content managers, mentors, homework coordinators, subject teachers, and super-admins, each with specific permissions.
This is what a course page looks like for students: watching webinars and lessons, completing and reviewing assignments.
Here’s the cart in the new store again.
Here’s the cart in the new store again.
LMS scenarios fall into five groups:
- Managing courses, schedules, and calendars—separately for students and mentors.
- Automatic and manual student group assignments.
- Educational content: watching webinars and lessons, completing and grading assignments.
- Viewing and sending notifications on the site and via social platforms for students and staff.
- Assignment discussion chats for students and mentors.
High-level architecture of the new Webium, from the documentation we handed over with the project.
LMS scenarios (detailed):
- Student authentication and authorization.
- Notifications.
- Educational content.
- Mentor and student chats.
- Course management and lifecycle.
- Student group assignments.
- Staff authentication, authorization, and role management.
Communication between key LMS components. Arrows on the left connect from the store.
For monitoring and error tracking, we used trusted tools — Datadog and Sentry. For CI/CD, we switched to GitHub Actions instead of CircleCI.
LMS Launch
7 months
Like the store, we had to integrate the new system with the existing one. For the store launch, we integrated with the old LMS; for the LMS launch, we synced with the new store.
We rolled it out in phases:
- webium.ru: The store site
- lms.webium.ru: The LMS site. Pre-launch, it ran the old LMS; post-launch, the new one.
- LMS admin panel.
- A backup domain for the old LMS post-launch.
What’s Next
During the relaunch, Webium hired a CTO and built an in-house dev team with our help. They coded alongside us and are now ready to take the platform forward.
Webium now has not just great teachers, marketers, product managers, designers, mentors, and instructors, but also awesome developers. We’re incredibly proud of the work we did. Ready to tackle the next challenge.
Team
FANS
Fedor Borshev,
Samat Galimov
Technical Directors
Nikita Alyoshnikov,
Backend Developer
Andrey Batsunov,
Frontend Developer
Alexey Bogoslovsky,
Full-Stack Developer
Mikhail Burmistrov,
Lead Frontend Developer, Project Lead
Anton Davydov,
Architect
Nikolay Kiryanov,
Backend Developer
Nikita Lazarenko,
Backend Developer
Vyacheslav Nabatchikov,
Backend Developer
Alexander Nesterov,
Frontend Developer
Ksenia Safronova,
Project Manager
Eduard Stepanov,
Backend Developer
Vladimir Taranovsky,
Frontend Developer
Alexey Chudin,
Lead Backend Developer
Webium
Roxana Borovik,
CEO
Victoria Garmash,
Product Manager
Nikita Savostin,
Technical Director
Alexander Evgrafov,
Art Director
Alina Tupikova,
Product Designer
Bogdan Pilyavets,
Lead Analyst
Andrey Aleynikov,
Analyst
Mikhail Gerun,
Project Manager
Evgeny Novikov,
Project Manager
Ilya Konanykhin,
Legacy System Developer
Mikhail Sakhno,
Backend Developer
Kirill Starikov,
Frontend Developer
Sergey Volkov,
Frontend Developer
Elena Mikirtumova,
Web Layout Designer
Roman Kovalev,
Lead SEO Specialist
Olga Rokossovskaya,
Tech Support and Testing
Katerina Klimova,
Tech Support and Testing
Pavel Romanov,
Technical Director (Pre-Relaunch Phase)
Evgeny Yuriev,
Legacy System Developer
Technologies
Planning and Management
Basecamp
FigJam
Figma
Development
Ruby
traefik
Express.js
Datadog
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