A laptop on a wooden desk at night, lit by a desk lamp, with the city lights beyond the window

The TCE Academy · Our learning journey

Our AI Journey

In February 2026 we began with little experience and a great deal to learn. Today the systems we built with Claude run our people, our café screens, our kitchen and our Academy. This is the road we took — and how we keep your data safe along it.

“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?” Isaiah 43:19
Walk the three stages See what we built Your data

Photo: Avtar Singh / Unsplash

Feb 2026our first lesson
1,300+saved changes to our systems
10+systems built with Claude
44courses on our Academy system

At the start of 2026 we could see the world of work changing gear. AI could read, write, plan and build. The employers who hire our learners were beginning to use it, and the charities and social enterprises around us were asking what it meant for them. If we stood still, the people who depend on us would be left behind with us.

We started with very little

We are a café, an Academy and a ministry — not a software house. Our experience was limited: none of us had built an app, designed a database, or read the Personal Data Protection Act with a builder’s eye. The first weeks were humbling. Tools would not install. Words like repository, deployment and row-level security meant nothing to us. A whole evening could disappear into a single error message.

“If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.”

James 1:5

So we prayed, and we kept going

With God’s help we pushed through. Since February 2026 we have put in hours of learning and testing, one problem at a time. We learned to ask better questions, to read carefully what came back, and to test everything with pretend people before a real person ever used it. Claude, the AI made by Anthropic, became a patient teacher and a tireless builder. We learned to be careful reviewers.

What the hours built

Today those hours run our HR — clocking in, leave, and the records our pay depends on. They run the Screens on our café walls, the new Menu system in our kitchen, and the new Academy system, where learners, lecturers and administrators each have a door of their own. Along the way came a café till, a notice board you edit by typing a sentence, and a songbook for prison ministry that works without the internet.

We share this not to boast. Everything in it was learned, and every good thing in it was given.

“What do you have that you did not receive?”

1 Corinthians 4:7
A single green shoot rising out of dark soil

Where we began

The day of small things

Our first attempts were small, slow and often wrong. We kept them anyway — every one of them taught us something.

“Who dares despise the day of small things…” Zechariah 4:10

Photo: Roman Synkevych / Unsplash

Introduction to Claude · the road we took

Three stages to working with AI

We did not learn it all at once. We learned it in three stages — first to talk with Claude, then to build with it, then to work alongside it every day. We are shaping those stages into an Academy course, so others can walk the same road with less stumbling.

“The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, for the ears of the wise seek it out.” Proverbs 18:15
Our learning curve, 2026 1 Talk 2 Build 3 Work
Our learning curve, February to September 2026 A line that starts low in February, dips into a valley in March — error messages, and words we did not yet know — then climbs: May, one brand guide for every document; June, our house rules taught to Claude as skills; July, our HR app; August, Screens, the café till and the Menu; September, the Academy system. Each point is marked with its stage: one, talk; two, build; three, work. still learning FEBMARAPRMAY JUNJULAUGSEP 2026 FEB · First questions Conversations with Claude The valley Error messages, and words we did not yet know MAY · One brand guide for every document we make JUN · Our house rules taught to Claude as skills JUL · Our HR app clock-in, leave and records AUG · Screens, till, Menu the café goes digital SEP · The Academy system three doors, 44 courses 113 222
  1. 1
    Feb · First questionsConversations with Claude
  2. Mar · The valleyError messages, and words we did not yet know
  3. 1
    May · One brand guidefor every document we make
  4. 3
    Jun · Our house rulestaught to Claude as skills
  5. 2
    Jul · Our HR appclock-in, leave and records
  6. 2
    Aug · Screens, till, Menuthe café goes digital
  7. 2
    Sep · The Academy systemthree doors, 44 courses
A laptop, a mug of coffee and a notebook on a wooden table

Photo: Social Mode / Unsplash

Stage one · Talk

Basic Claude

For everyone — no experience needed

Start with a conversation. Claude, on the web or on your phone, can draft, summarise, translate, explain — and think a problem through with you. The skill to learn is asking well: give it the context, show it an example, and ask it to check its own work.

  • Asking clear questions, with context
  • Drafting letters, lessons and plans
  • Checking an answer before you trust it
In our work

Lesson outlines, letters, and one brand guide that now shapes every document we make.

A laptop showing lines of code on a table in a warmly lit room Most of our hours

Photo: James Harrison / Unsplash

Stage two · Build

Claude Code

You describe it — Claude writes the programme

Here Claude stops only answering and starts building. You describe what you need in plain English; Claude Code writes the programme, runs the tests and explains what it did. Your job changes: you become the one who decides, reviews and tests.

  • Describing a system in plain words
  • Reviewing and testing what Claude builds
  • Keeping code, data and passwords apart
In our work

Our HR app, Screens, the Menu and the Academy system — more than 1,300 saved changes since July 2026.

Baristas at work behind a busy coffee bar, with order screens on the counter

Photo: atelierbyvineeth / Unsplash

Stage three · Work

Claude at work

For teams — AI woven into the day

Now Claude works alongside you: connected to the tools you already use, carrying your house rules as skills, and built into your own apps where it can take real work off your hands — with a person approving what matters.

  • Skills: teaching Claude your house rules
  • Connecting your shop, files and email safely
  • Putting AI inside an app, with a person to approve
In our work

A notice board that turns a typed sentence into proposed changes, and supplier invoices read straight into our kitchen costs.

Our road was not straight — we taught Claude our house rules before we built our first app. The course puts the stages in the order we wish we had met them.

An Academy course in the making — no dates or fees yet

Want to walk the three stages with us? Register your interest and we will write to you when dates are set. New to computers? Begin with our free course, Digital Literacy & Online Safety — four hours, one evening.

Register your interest See our courses

What the hours built · examples of our work

Built with Claude. Run by people.

Each of these began as a few sentences from us. Claude turned them into a working system; we tested it, questioned it and put it to work. Here is what we asked for — and what we got.

We typed

opening is delayed to 21st september. food tasting next week. plumbing and power testing today and tomorrow.

Claude proposed

  • MoveCafé opening → 21 September
  • AddFood tasting · next week
  • AddPlumbing & power testing · today
  • AddPlumbing & power testing · tomorrow

An illustration from our notice board, calendar.tceacademy.org. Nothing changes until a person presses Apply — and then all of it changes together, or none of it does.

Every member of staff · since July 2026

Our HR system

The heart of our people work: a phone app for every member of staff, an iPad on each café wall for clocking in, and a web console for managers — one set of records behind all three.

We asked

Put all the information — attendance and leave — in one place for the manager to manage the team.

Claude built

  • A Team tab: today’s attendance beside the leave queue.
  • Clock-in by a code on the café wall that changes every 45 seconds.
  • Leave approved in two steps, by the right people.
Phone appCafé iPadWeb console

Café marketing · since August 2026

Screens

What is on each café television, and when. Pictures and short films change with the hour and the day of the week, all planned on one weekly map.

We asked

A television on a café wall has no keyboard and no one to press anything. It has to run itself.

Claude built

  • A weekly map: this picture, on this screen, between these times.
  • No app on the television — it opens a web address, and that is all.
  • It comes back by itself after a power cut.
Weekly schedulePortrait or landscape

Our kitchen · Buy · Prepare · Sell

The Menu system

Costing, recipes and portions for every bowl we serve — measured by the gram, from the invoice to the counter.

We asked

A new way to prepare the bowl — not by serving size, but by the grammage. And the cost is scanned in from the invoices; we don’t enter it.

Claude built

  • Buy — supplier invoices read straight into our costs, nothing typed.
  • Prepare — today’s prep list: what to have ready, what to weigh.
  • Sell — the grams each bowl size is served.
Cost per gramTill sales, read-only

Three doors · since September 2026

The Academy system

Three doors to one system — students.tceacademy.org for learners, library.tceacademy.org for lecturers, and administration.tceacademy.org for the office.

We asked

Users can only see what they are assigned. A manager can see a grouping. Directors can see all, and assign users to courses.

Claude built

  • 44 courses in three groupings — Body, Mind and Spirit.
  • Access rules written into the database itself, proven by 97 checks before any change goes live.
  • Learners get their workbook and slides, and a numbered certificate when they finish.
Three doorsEvery Spirit course free

And along the way

Café till & kitchen displayOrders from the counter and from phones go straight to the kitchen screen and the receipt printer.
A notice board you talk toType a sentence; Claude proposes the changes; a person presses Apply.
Our devotion pipelineClaude researches and drafts; every verse is fetched from the Bible text itself — never recalled from memory — and none repeats within a year.
A prison-ministry songbook780 songs in English, Chinese and Hokkien, with chords, that runs from a USB stick with no internet at all.
A client’s staff caféA complete till, kitchen board and online ordering for a corporate client — on a database of its own.
Two websites, one front doortheofficialtce.com and tceacademy.org share one menu, kept in step from one place.

Claude is an AI made by Anthropic. It wrote most of our code; people decided what it should do, checked what it did, and remain answerable for it.

PDPA and other considerations

Your data, kept with care

Building our own systems means we answer for the data inside them. Singapore’s Personal Data Protection Act 2012 shaped how each one was built — it is not a box we tick at the end.

1 The PDPA, in practice

Consent · Purpose · NotificationOnly what we need

We ask for what a task needs, say what it is for, and use it for that purpose — nothing more.

ProtectionEach person sees their own

Access rules live in the database itself, not just on the screen. A learner sees their own courses; a lecturer, the classes they teach; a manager, their grouping.

PDPC advisory on NRICNRIC handled with care

Where we must hold an NRIC number, only a named few see it in full; everyone else sees S****567A. It never appears in a web address or a log.

Retention limitationNot kept for ever

Sensitive records carry a date by which they are erased. When that date passes, they go.

Transfer limitationKept in Singapore

Our staff and learner records are stored in Singapore. When an app asks AI for help, it sends the task — a sentence, an invoice — not people’s records.

AccountabilityEvery change leaves a trail

Every change to an Academy record is logged automatically, and our Data Protection Officer is accountable for how data is handled.

Access & correctionSee it, correct it

You may ask what we hold about you, and ask us to correct it. Write to us with the form at the foot of this page.

Breach notificationIf something goes wrong

We will tell you — and the Personal Data Protection Commission — as the law requires.

2 Beyond the law — using AI well

People decideAI suggests. People decide.

No AI decides anyone’s pay, leave, marks or certificate — people do. Where Claude changes something others act on, a person approves it first.

AccuracyChecked against the source

AI can sound sure and still be wrong. So we check it against the source: a verse against the Bible text, a price against the invoice.

TestingTried on pretend people

Every system is tried with made-up staff and learners before a real person uses it. Real names and numbers never appear in our tests.

SecurityNo passwords in code

Passwords and keys are never written into our code, and download links expire within two minutes.

CopyrightCredit where it is due

Every photograph names its photographer, and Scripture is quoted with permission.

AccessibilityReadable by everyone

Every colour pairing is checked for contrast (WCAG 2.1 AA), and our lecturers’ pages use larger type and bigger keys.

TransparencyHonest about AI

We say when AI helped — as we do on this page, which was written and built with Claude and checked by our team.

Dignity firstAI serves people

Every hour Claude saves our team is an hour given back to a learner. It does not replace the people who walk with them.

This page describes how our systems are built; it is not our full privacy policy. Read that here. A question about your data? Use the form below and tick “A question about my data”.

What God taught us on the way

“‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.”

Zechariah 4:6 · We did not get here on skill. We got here on grace, and on the next hour of trying.

Photo: Mad Fish Digital / Unsplash

Your turn · walk the road with us

Learn with us

If a café team can learn this, so can you. Whether you are taking your first steps online, leading a charity that wonders where to begin, or able to teach what you know — come and learn with us.

Start with the basicsDigital Literacy & Online Safety — free, four hours, one evening.
Introduction to ClaudeRegister your interest in the three stages. We will write when dates are set.
Learn alongside usCharities and social enterprises: see what we built, and what we would do differently.
Teach what you knowCan you code, design or protect data? Mentor our team or our learners.
Ask about your dataWant to see or correct what we hold about you? Tell us here.
PrayFor wisdom for our team, and for the learners these tools serve.

“Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”

Philippians 1:6

Count me in.

Tell us a little about yourself. We read every reply ourselves.

What would you like? (tick any)

Your details go only to The TCE Academy team (hello@tceacademy.org), and only to reply to you. No lists, no spam. Privacy policy.

“May the favour of the Lord our God rest on us; establish the work of our hands for us — yes, establish the work of our hands.” Psalm 90:17

Still learning. Still testing.
To God be the glory.

Count me in

Brewing the Aroma of 2nd Chances · Soli Deo Gloria

Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version® NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Claude is a product of Anthropic.