AI-powered Alpha Schools expands to 50 campuses
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The high-end, AI-powered private school Alpha Schools plans to grow from a dozen to roughly 50 campuses in the 2026 school year, its founder tells Axios.
Why it matters: While traditional schools navigate how to adopt AI, Alpha Schools has created an AI-dependent classroom model that the company claims reduces screen time and increases human interaction.
- "Alpha is one of probably the most talked about schools in the country right now," says MacKenzie Price, co-founder and CEO of Alpha Schools.
- Tuition costs $45,000 to $75,000 a year.
How it works: Students spend no more than two hours a day on AI software to learn core subjects, Price says. They spend the rest of the day developing life skills in workshops. For example, in Austin, students organized a music festival for a nonprofit.
- Instead of licensed teachers conducting lessons, Alpha Schools hires "guides" whose jobs are to motivate and coach students. They're paid at least $100,000 a year.
What they're saying: Price criticizes the traditional school system for its failure to implement AI. She says schools either allow chatbots to "run rampant" or ban the technology outright.
- "AI allows us to finally, truly transform the educational system and not just have it be a little tool that keeps a traditional, one-teacher-in-front-of-a-classroom model going," Price says.
The big picture: As AI races ahead, many public schools have been slow to put clear guardrails around the technology.
- Just 18% of teachers in public K-12 schools in a Gallup study released in May said they've received any formal guidance from school administrators on how to use AI tools.
- Meanwhile, parents are balancing whether letting their children use AI strengthens digital literacy or results in cognitive decline. The research is limited.
- "Right now we're conducting a gigantic experiment on the human population, on our children, without any good scientific knowledge," says Gerald LeTendre, a Penn State education professor.
Friction point: LeTendre says his concern with AI education models — including Unbound Academy and Khan Lab School — is they risk conflating teaching and tutoring. But those are not the same thing, he says.
- "AI tutoring can help, but it has to be within an atmosphere where there's deep human contact with a highly qualified teacher," he adds.
- He argues helping teachers become proficient in AI is a more promising strategy than replacing them.
What's next: This school year, Alpha plans to open campuses in 27 markets, including Atlanta, Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Denver, Nashville and Raleigh.
- Some of those campuses were previously announced and delayed, largely because of issues with the real estate, Price says.
- Alpha's dozen locations include several campuses in California, Texas and Florida. It expects to grow its New York City campus from 22 to 160 students this year.
