DRGx Design · proposal for Custom Image

Unlock the infrastructure for training & workforce development.

Custom Image already does the hard part — it teaches real trades to youth, young adults, and under-skilled, financially-challenged Angelenos, and turns them into credentialed workers. DRGx builds the system that lets it run at scale, prove its outcomes, and grow — a multi-tenant platform you unlock one gate at a time, funded the way your tuition is.

501(c)(3) trade school
6 credentialed trades
WASC-aligned evidence
workforce development
Why now

A workforce mission running on a borrowed template.

The teaching is real. The infrastructure underneath it isn't yet — and that ceiling caps how many people Custom Image can serve and how well it can prove the impact funders pay for.

Today
  • ×Generic WordPress theme with content that doesn't match the trades
  • ×"Enroll" buttons with no system behind them — no student record
  • ×No way to track completion, attendance, or certificates
  • ×Nothing to show WASC or a grant-maker as evidence
  • ×No path to a second campus or partner program
Unlocked
  • A purpose-built platform from the real curriculum
  • Every student enrolled, tracked, and credentialed
  • Attendance, progress, and certificates captured automatically
  • Accreditation & grant evidence generated from live data
  • Ready to onboard new campuses and partner orgs
What you're unlocking

A school in front. An engine behind.

Students, instructors, and funders see the school — the trades, the people, the outcomes. The infrastructure that runs it stays out of their way, built on a backend that scales.

The school — what people see

A public site, a student experience, an instructor toolkit, and a staff back office — all built from Custom Image's real trades and mission.

public sitestudent appinstructor appschool opsscheduling

The engine — DRGx builds & runs it

A multi-tenant Supabase backend: secure access, one source of truth, automated workflows, and the evidence layer accreditation needs.

Supabase Postgresmulti-tenant RLSedge functionsstorageDRGx managed
The unlock ladder

Eight gates. Unlock them as you fund them.

Each gate is a working slice of the infrastructure — drafted as a real screen you can show a board first, then made live. You review it, sign off, and that capability unlocks. Nothing is rebuilt; it just turns on.

G0

Secure access for everyone

The right door for staff, instructors, and students — and the control panel that decides what's unlocked.

Supabaseroles · RLSfeature flags
you can now

Sign people in safely, by role, fully isolated.

G1

Enroll students & track every step

The core: real enrollment into real cohorts, with online-theory and hands-on-lab progress tracked to completion.

OPS coreenroll-student()
you can now

Run live enrollment and see who's progressing.

G2

Fill your cohorts

A public site and an application pipeline — interest, info sessions, intake, review, and a waitlist that auto-offers scarce lab seats.

MKT · ENRsubmit-application()
you can now

Recruit and convert applicants, with referral partners tracked.

G3

Guide every student to completion

Onboarding, lessons, lab sessions, a personal schedule, project submissions, and the certificate at the end.

student appissue-certificate()
you can now

Move students from day one to a credential.

G4

Equip your instructors

Attendance, in-line project review, and a builder that lets working tradespeople author courses without a developer.

instructor appreview-submission()
you can now

Let instructors teach, not wrangle paperwork.

G5

Run every trade without collisions

Term planning that treats your equipment — presses, machines, the sandblast booth — as the real constraint it is.

schedulingcheck-conflicts()
you can now

Schedule six trades on finite equipment, safely.

G6

Prove it to WASC & funders

Learner outcomes, a standards crosswalk, an evidence repository, a self-study workspace, and annual reports built from live data.

ACC layergenerate-report()
you can now

Generate accreditation & grant evidence on demand.

G7

Fund it, verify it, grow it

Donations and tuition credits, publicly verifiable certificates, and onboarding for a second campus or partner program.

funding · scaleonboard-tenant()
you can now

Close the funding loop and replicate the model.

Why this wins funding

The numbers a workforce funder pays for — produced automatically.

Workforce boards, grant-makers, and WASC all ask for the same evidence. Once the infrastructure is unlocked, Custom Image stops assembling it by hand and starts generating it from live data.

Enrollment & completion

Who started, who finished, and where they dropped — by trade and by cohort.

Credentials earned

Verifiable certificates issued, the workforce credential funders count.

Who you served

Demographics and referral sources — the equity story, documented.

Pathways to work

Industry & partner connections that turn a credential into a job.

The unlock model

Unlock the infrastructure as you fund it.

A foundation to start, a flat retainer to run it, and gates you unlock on your own timeline — sized to map onto grant cycles.

Foundation · G0 + G1
$5,000 starting
Supabase stood up and live enrollment + tracking — the working core, yours from day one.
Managed infrastructure
$750 / month
DRGx runs the engine — hosting, monitoring, backups, security — so staff never touch it.
Gates G2–G7 are scoped and quoted as you go. Each is a clean acceptance milestone: review the gate against what it unlocks, sign off, and that capability turns on for Custom Image unlock. Because the gates are sized to grant cycles, the platform can be funded the same way student tuition is — gate by gate, as the grants come in. You're never paying for more than you've unlocked.

Let's unlock the first gate.

DRGx stands up the foundation and the live enrollment core. Custom Image keeps doing what it does best — turning people into skilled, credentialed workers.

customimage.org·(424) 480-9691·DRGx Design