Most people hate the idea. Trust issues run deep. People still won’t listen to AI music 🤖. And who knew AI was this bad at pizza? 🍕 Safe toppings are apparently a mystery.
But wealth changes things. A lot of money ignores the red flags. America’s wealthy are swapping teachers for algorithms.
They don’t call it that though. Companies like Forge Prep and Alpha School are selling a vision. Or at least a prototype. Prices run tens of thousands of dollars. Parents are paying for beta tests on their own children. “Interactive project-based workshops” sounds nice until you see the bill.
Silicon Valley loves this stuff. Who doesn’t bet on themselves? Shaun Johnson is a San Francisco VC. He’s sending his kid to Alpha Kindergarten. Cost is $75,00 a year. Just to start.
Johnson thinks the system is broken. Fair enough. He wants kids who can think fast. Not recite facts. He told the WSJ that entrepreneurs will fix it.
Here’s the catch. How do you teach a child to navigate the world when your teacher is sycophantic by design? 🤔
Then there is MacKenzie Price. Cofounder of Alpha School. She wants to keep “hot-button social issues out” of class. In the current climate what does that cover? Slavery. Immigrant history. Women’s rights.
Sure, it’s kindergarten. Mostly. But Alpha goes up to high school in some places. So the curriculum gets weird fast. Or rather gets very quiet about everything hard.
