Price describes Alpha as a full school day built around a two-hour academic core. Mornings open with a 15-minute “limitless launch,” then students work through math, reading, science, and history in 25-minute focus sessions with an AI tutor that pinpoints exactly what each child knows and serves lessons at the right level and pace. Afternoons are for life-skills workshops: coding self-driving go-karts, running food-truck businesses, and learning to sail. One group of fifth through seventh graders sailed from Florida to the Bahamas as their final test.
The edtech, she insists, is not the secret. Motivation is 90% of what creates a good learner, and Alpha’s guides, about half of them former traditional teachers and all starting at $100,000 a year, do no lecturing or grading. Their entire job is connection, motivation, and emotional support. Rowe plays the skeptic throughout, pressing Price on screen time, socialization, gifted kids, unmotivated kids, and discipline. She answers with results: Alpha classes score in the top 1% nationally, students arriving at the 15th percentile and the 95th both post growth rates in the 80s and 90s, and 96% of students say they love school.
The conversation closes with money and scale. Flagship tuition runs $40,000 to $75,000, and Price doesn’t dodge it. She describes a deliberate “Tesla business model”: prove the concept at the high end, then drive costs down through $10,000 models, ESA-funded seats at Texas Sports Academy, and roughly 30 campuses opening by fall 2026. Her pitch for public schools is even simpler: run academics until noon, then let sports and arts fill the afternoon.
Core academics happen in a two-hour morning block of 25-minute focus sessions with breaks, but school runs a full day, roughly 8:45 to 3:30. Afternoons are life-skills workshops, projects, and physical activity, and there’s no homework at night.
No. The AI tutor handles instruction, but every classroom has adult guides, about half of them former teachers, all starting at $100,000 a year. Their full-time job is motivation, connection, and coaching. Price says the transformed adult role, not the edtech, is what makes the model work.
Classes scoring in the top 1% across grade levels and subjects, growth rates in the 80s and 90s for both struggling and advanced students, kids gaining multiple grade levels in months, and 96% of students saying they love school. Price acknowledges the dataset is still small and says results are published transparently.
Flagship tuition runs $40,000 to $75,000, but Price describes a “Tesla model” for scaling down: $10,000-a-year schools, Texas ESAs making Texas Sports Academy free for qualifying families, and about 30 campuses opening by fall 2026. Starting this fall, she says roughly three times as many students will pay no tuition as pay it today.
