⚡ Free · Hands-on · UK-shaped

Mermoid Academy — modern AI in the workplace, safely.

Short, practical lessons on using AI without breaking the law, leaking PII, or getting your team in front of an EHRC tribunal. Every lesson uses Mermoid's live tools so you actually do the thing, not just read about it.

No signup for read-along 10-15 min lessons GDPR Art. 22 + EU AI Act current Live Mermoid demos embedded CIPD Level 7 voice

3 tracks · pick the one that matches your role

Lessons marked ● LIVE are written + working today. DRAFT are scaffolded — coming next round.

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Track A · Foundations

AI in the Workplace, Safely

For everyone who touches AI tools at work — recruiters, HR, line managers, ops. The "what is this thing actually doing and how do I not get fired" track.
📚 6 lessons ⏱ 90 min total 📈 Beginner
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Track D · Job-seekers · NEW

Build Your CV Safely with AI

For job-seekers. Real working demos: polish your bullets one at a time, score your CV against the actual job ad, and stay on the right side of the line between "AI helped me phrase this" and "AI invented things I didn't do."
📚 4 lessons ⏱ 50 min total 📈 Beginner
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Track B · Compliance

UK Recruitment Compliance for AI Users

For recruiters, agencies and ATS platforms. The Equality Act, EHRC, sector regulators (CQC, FCA), and how AI fits into UK recruitment law without making your firm a test case.
📚 4 lessons ⏱ 60 min total 📈 Intermediate
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Track C · Hands-on

Build with AI Coding Agents

For technical teams. Install opencode or Claude Code, wire Mermoid's MCP into your agent, ship audit-clean recruitment workflows in an afternoon.
📚 3 lessons ⏱ 60 min total 📈 Developer
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Track E · Engineer · NEW

Build with the Mermoid Engine

For developers. Forty minutes from your first curl to a 30-line opencode-style recursive driver. Every lesson runs /api/ask live and uses the new next_questions recursion field to self-drive through the 43-tool MCP catalogue.
📚 4 lessons ⏱ 40 min total 📈 Developer

Who this is for

The lessons are short, sectoral, and assume you've used ChatGPT once but you're not a developer.

👔 Recruiters & agencies

Stop pasting CVs into ChatGPT. Learn what's safe, what isn't, and how to keep an audit trail your client can show their regulator.

🩺 Care managers

CQC's expectations on AI-assisted hiring. NMC, Care Certificate, MCA — what AI can verify, what it can't, what you must still do manually.

💼 HR / People teams

EHRC compliance, Disability Confident at AI-pipeline scale, Article 22 reviewability, and writing JDs that AI doesn't bias against neurodivergent candidates.

🛠️ Developers

Wire Mermoid's MCP into opencode / Claude Code / Cursor. Agent-native UK regulatory checks in your IDE.

🏢 ATS / platform teams

EU AI Act high-risk classification — does your product trigger it? Article 14 human-oversight requirements, conformity assessments, what "auditable" means in practice.

🎓 Job-seekers

How AI is reading your CV. How to write one that survives. How to disclose AI use in your own application without lying.

Why we built this

This isn't another "intro to ChatGPT" course.

The market is saturated with generic AI training. What's missing is sector-specific UK material — the kind that takes EU AI Act high-risk classification, EHRC bias guidance, Article 22 of UK GDPR, and the sector-specific regulators (CQC, FCA, Ofsted) and turns them into a 90-minute working knowledge for someone whose job involves hiring or being hired.

It's free because the alternative is bad.

We watched £400/seat AI training products tell HR teams to "be careful with personal data" and call it a day. That's malpractice. So this is free — supported by Mermoid's API revenue, not learner fees.

Why is it tied to Mermoid?

Because the lessons aren't theoretical — they use Mermoid's live tools. When you read about PII redaction in Lesson 2, you actually run a CV through parse_cv with redact_pii=true and see the output. When you read about JD bias in Track B, you put your own JD into score_jd and watch it flag age-coded language. The platform is the textbook.

Will there be a certificate?

Phase 2. Once the full lesson set is written, we'll add quizzes + a downloadable certificate of completion you can show your CIPD CPD log. CIPD Level 7 author = recognised CPD activity.

Can I contribute?

Yes — sector-specific lessons (legal AI use, financial-services AI risk) are welcome. Email academy@properfithire.co.uk with the angle. We'll publish under your byline.

Start with Lesson 1

12 minutes. No signup. By the end you'll know the difference between regex, embeddings, and a large language model — and which to trust with what.

Start Track A → Lesson 1 Skip to Track C (devs)