Name: Alpha School Information Session
Uploaded: 2026-04-22T19:16:27.211Z
Duration: 1 h 30 min 12 s
Description: Alpha School Information Session

Transcript for "Alpha School Information Session": Welcome to our national audience. My name is Jamal Gross, and we are so excited to have you here tonight. And as you know, you're sitting in the middle of a virtual chat, so we want you to send your questions, your thoughts. If you have an emoji you wanna share, feel free to put it in there. We have a lot of people moderating that, so you'll be able to get real time feedback on some of your questions. But tonight, it's all about getting a clear picture of what makes Alpha different. Right? What what unlocks your child's potential? How it looks like from a day to day perspective. And we'll we'll hear testimonies from parents, we'll hear from students, and we will also hear from our cofounder, our innovator, our parents, our our team parent, Mackenzie Price. Hi, Jamal. It's so much fun to be here, isn't it? It is a blast. This is fun. So we're here in Austin High School. Yeah. We call it c o two. We're here. And you mentioned the parent thing. This is actually my last year being an alpha parent because I have a senior who's graduating at the end of the year. Congratulations. So this is where she's at every day. But I'll tell you there's nothing I like talking more about than education. I think there's never been a more exciting time to be a five year old, or a 10 year old or a 15 year old at Alpha. So this is gonna be fun. This is gonna be so much fun. And and we'll get right into it. There's so many things happening in the future of education. And you, in particular, saw some opportunities to make it better. Can you talk about kind of the core of what all of this is, where it came from? Yeah. You know, fundamentally, where this all started was I I'm a mom. I have two little girls, and when it was time for them to go to school, we sent them to our our local very good public school district. Mhmm. But very quickly, what I started to see was just the lack of ability for, the school to be able to provide kind of that personalized touch that meets kids where they're at. And, you know, it's very hard to do that in in the classroom where the teacher would say, hey. I need a little bit of time to get to know these Yep. You know, 19 students. You know, how do we do that? But it all culminated, when my oldest daughter was in second grade, she came home one day and she said, mom, I don't wanna go to school tomorrow. And I was like, what do you mean? You love school. And she looked at me and she just said, school is so boring. And that broke my heart. I just was like, this can't be the rest of her career. This cannot be the rest of my second daughter's school career where they're gonna go spend nine months a year, five days a week, all day long. This should not be what it is. And, I met with the principal of our school, and she was a wonderful administrator and shared with her just the concerns I had and the struggles we were feeling. And she said, Mackenzie, I totally get it, but this is like trying to steer the Titanic. It just can't be done. And at that point, that's when I realized it wasn't about this school in particular. It wasn't about going from public school to private school. Right. It was really a model problem. It's that traditional teacher in front of a classroom model where there's one teacher leading a group of students who are all at wildly different levels through material at the same pace at the same time, that is not what works. And so for me, what I sort of, did was was sat down and said, okay. If we were gonna reimagine school, what would we do? And if and if resources were not a problem, we could kinda do anything we want, what would that look like? And the parents that came together to create what alpha is, really made something I believe that was special. And it's fundamentally based on this premise that we believe kids are limitless. Right? They can do so many amazing awesome things. You saw it when you ran an Airbnb workshop with the kids, you know, a couple years ago. And that was such a popular thing that you just give kids the ability to have an environment where we hold them to really high standards Mhmm. But we also provide really high support Mhmm. Then the question just becomes, like, what is possible? And we found the sky's the limit. And so when we look at, what we designed, the answer is alpha. And I've got a video that kinda shows more. That's awesome. What started in Austin is spreading across the country. Families are discovering the future of education. It was clear day one that they loved it. Our kids love school. They wanna go all weekend. My son, he goes, I wanna go to school here. And I said, one out of 10, what do you give to school? And he goes, 10. I have to say I was skeptical. How's this gonna work? The bar is set so high, and he keeps wanting to climb higher and higher. It's like he was in a little shell. Somebody saw him. He just came alive. When Alpha Miami opened, six families took a chance. Within a year, more than 60 families joined them. They built not just a school, but a community. What your kid is going to receive and how much your kid is gonna grow is going to be fantastic. We really wanted a school that was gonna be sure to come out of our shell and be confident, and I got this. We see him take ownership of his learning. Across every Alpha campus, families are leading a movement. This is a new thing, and it's a little bit disruptive. It seems like at risk. I think the bigger risk is keeping your child in a system that's not accomplishing the goals that you want. This school understands the different learning styles for each student. The balance of personalized learning and focus on life skills is unlike any other school that we've ever seen. As a parent, you want your child to know that the sky's the limit. Whoever wants their kids to be leaders, to be kind, wonderful people, this is the right school for you. See, that's the kind of school that, I wish I'd gotten to go to Yeah. When I was growing up, and I think, that just gives a little glimpse of, like, what we're trying to create in this environment where, really, school should be a place that unlocks kids' potential and helps them to, see their abilities to to do big things. And you talk about school unlocking a kid's potential and and school in general, it's it's a big thing. Right? There's so much that goes into making a school, making it something completely different to make it successful. But at Alpha's core, if there were if the three commitments that you all have, what is it? Yeah. So we live and die by the commitments that we promise to deliver to every single student and their family. And everybody who who works at Alpha and is involved in Alpha wakes up each day saying, how can we make sure we're delivering these three commitments? So, the first commitment is that kids will love school. Mhmm. And I know when I first say that, you know, kind of people are like, okay. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Okay. My kid loves school. But I always ask parents to, like, ask your kid, do you love school? And, usually, what you'll get if you ask a kid, you know, what do you like about school? They'll say the same few things. Can you guess what they are? Right? Going to lunch, recess, friend hanging out with friends. And PE. Right? PE. PE. Those are the things. Yep. And those are all great things, but you know what? School should be so much more than that. And so we take this commitment very seriously, which is that kids will love school. In fact, we survey our students every session, which is about every eight weeks. Do you love school? Yes or no? And, this most recent session, it was, like, 96% of our students said they love school. But, you know, the question we're always asking ourselves is how high is high? Like, what is really possible when we're reimagining school? So we take it even further Yep. And we ask this question, would you rather go to school or go on vacation? Did you ever wanna go to school over vacation, Jamal? Not me. I certainly didn't. I was one of those kids who did not like school Right. At all at all. It was that and we think that's a pretty hard bar. And I will tell you, it does depend on the session workshops for that week that that session. It depends on what vacation maybe the family's got planned. Right. But we generally get anywhere between 4060% of our students will say, I would rather go to school than go on vacation. And what we really get commonly is parents will come to us and say, you know, my kid was like, it's Saturday. Why don't we have school on the weekends? Can't we be back on Monday? Right. And I think even more fundamentally, one of the things I love hearing from parents is just that they're like, you know what's great is Monday morning's no longer this drag to, like, get my kid out of bed. My kids are like, hey. I gotta be there. I gotta go. And we believe that when kids love school, it allows us to basically encourage them to do really challenging hard things. And to be clear, when you say love school, it does not mean every day is Disneyland. Right. Sometimes things are gonna be hard. In fact, we believe that failure is something that is a really key component of learning and building. And we wanna create this environment where kids can can they can try something. They can be challenged. They can struggle. They can fail. But they wake up every day with, like, a fire in their belly and this engagement that says, I love school. So that's something really important. Yeah. It's just they're they're that so that's our first commitment. Yeah. Our second commitment is that kids can learn twice as much in only two hours a day. This is our two hour learning. And the way this all works, and we get a lot of attention around this, is, we use, an AI tutor platform Mhmm. To be able to provide exactly the level and pace of learning that a student needs. It's not a chatbot. Chatbots are cheap bots when it comes to education. Instead, what this platform does is it's able to very price precisely assess what a student knows and what they don't know Mhmm. And then puts them in the right level and pace of knowledge. And so when kids are getting this one to one mastery based tutoring experience, You know, think to what Plato and Aristotle did. That's not been possible in the traditional teacher in front of the classroom model that we've had for a couple hundred years now. Mhmm. Kids are able to not just complete their academics in two hours, but absolutely crush their academics. So, you know, our classes are top 1% in all grades, all subjects, in the country. We are very adamant about measuring our results. So we use something called NWEA MAP assessments three times a year in order to measure basically the rate of growth. And that's the other thing that I think parents get really impressed with is not only our our classes ninety ninth percentile, but the growth rates for our students. Yeah. And so Yeah. You no longer have that situation of, you know, a kid who, the school says, listen. They're doing fine. They're advanced. They just let them chill out a little bit. There's no limit to this. And I think that's something that families love, and it gets kids really excited and engaged on that. Right. And then that brings us to our third commitment, which is one thing that we know is that parents do not want their kids to come home after two hours. Are you kidding me? No. Of course. You'll learn this when you have a when you have a baby and you're heading off to school in, in five years Good. That it's like, you know, school's a bundle. There's a lot of aspects of school that are really important to be at. And so then the question is, okay. If you realize you no longer have to spend, you know, six hours a day sitting in class doing academics, You can instead do all of your academic learning in this two hour period. What do you do with the rest of the day? Mhmm. And that leads to our third commitment, which is that kids will learn life skills. And these skills are the things that I think are what are so critical for, our young people to be able to learn to be ready to go out in this world. So in addition to having the academic knowledge that they need to be successful, they need to learn things like leadership Mhmm. Teamwork Mhmm. Financial literacy and entrepreneurship, you know, grit and hard work, public speaking and storytelling, and relationship building and socialization. Those are skills that we spend all of our afternoons doing these project based group workshops where kids are are learning how to how to basically take these skills and be successful. And, I think one of the things that I often will hear when I talk to parents is they're excited about, you know, the academic part of it, but they end up coming in and they're like, okay. It's these afternoons that are just magical. Right? Yeah. And the kids love getting to do these workshops and they have a variety of them. There's there's physical workshops. We had kids who, you know, sailed, learned how to sail and did a teamwork and communication life skill workshop, and ended up sailing over a five day period from Miami to The Bahamas. Yeah. Right? They get to do things like that. You were the mastermind of that Airbnb workshop that was done. Last year, we did a food truck workshop, where kids were able to learn, you know, not only how to cook, but how to budget, how to build a business, how to market, how to do customer service, all of those skills that you learn when you're out doing something fun. And these are opportunities that we that we really enjoy getting the show for our kids. That's incredible. And hearing it all from the cofounder is one thing, but it's it's a whole other step when you can hear that testimonial from a parent that You are totally right. There's only so much that people wanna hear from, like, me or from guides who are telling it. It's really about our parents. Right. And for that very reason, we we invited the Ackerson family here who we are so excited to have. Thank you all for joining us. Hey, guys. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for coming. So one of the things that, is so unique when when contemplating what school to put your child at is you you take the tour, you see different campuses, you see different environments, but, ultimately, there's some moment that pulls you in. Could you speak to that what that was for you all? Yeah. We were living in Connecticut Wow. Actually, and had had this moment of, I don't know, May maybe Austin. So we decided to fly out just for a couple of days with our daughters. Mhmm. And, and we have three. We have three fierce little girls. Mhmm. And one of the few things we did in Austin was tour alpha. We had asked people we knew who lived here, what school should we go check out? And it was a resounding alpha. Mhmm. And so we did a tour and didn't even frame it for our daughters, like, this was going to be an opportunity they were gonna have. It was more of an intellectual exercise. And the way they just lit up as they were learning about the program, the, you know, personalized incentive structures, the way that guides worked with them, all of the workshops. They just we fit we finished the tour and left the school, and they said, gosh. I would love to go to a school like that. And we said, well, we're gonna have to move if you wanna if you wanna go to Alpha. And they said, we'd be up for that. We'd and so it was an incredible sort of moment for our family going, you know, from a life design perspective. Yeah. There's nothing better than having your kids in a school where they're just gonna come alive. Yeah. And that sealed the deal for us on the move. We were like, this is we gotta do this. Well, I have to tell you on the, back to school barbecue night that we had at the Alpha High in Austin, I was amazed when there were, like, seven families that had moved from all over the world, you know, and all over the country to be able to come to Alpha. Now good news is Alpha is now coming to a lot of places. So so people probably don't have to move on that. But my friends across the country are psyched about that. That's right. It cannot happen fast enough. That's awesome. Yeah. It was really interesting. I think there were, you know, we had thought a lot about this, what, you know, the education system and and sort of what environment we wanted for the girls as we thought about where the world is gonna be in ten, fifteen, twenty years. And one of the things that was really kind of fascinating about alpha that we had been missing in a lot of ways were sort of three aspects. One was learning through creativity Mhmm. And collaboration, and the opportunity to really learn not just through rote or through verbal instruction or even through, you know, written homework, of which there is none, which was a key selling point for the girls, homework that is. But it was really the opportunity to do that in both creativity on their own and then also on projects and teams that were really kind of exciting. I think the second, and this is the most pronounced thing that we've seen, has been agency. The girls have enormous ownership of sort of their own education process, their own learning styles, the pacing of which they learn or don't learn, and so they really got sort of to run as fast as they wanted to. And I think and the third, which was also important to us, was performance. It was the ability to really push themselves. Not, hey, I just need to meet this threshold, this hurdle, this test, but really to start viewing education and viewing their own learning through the lens of agency, but also through the lens of measurable quantitative Yeah. Almost athleticism. Yeah. So they're constantly pushing themselves and not in a way that's driven by external stress or internal stress, but in a, hey, I saw what I could achieve when I put my mind to it. And I really with an athleticism, I wanna keep getting faster. I wanna keep getting better. And that has been really fun to watch. And and they've lived into it. So one of our fifth graders is in ninth grade math and tenth grade English, and she is just elated because no one is slowing her down. Mhmm. You know, and it's not even about what her peers are doing necessarily. Right? It's about her and how far she can stretch. And the other thing that they've lived into that I've loved is such a richer social environment. Mhmm. So they love the collaboration. You know, in a traditional school model, you're kind of working on a few things in the classroom, maybe around homework. You know, there's there's a little bit of group work, but at Alpha, the collaboration, the partnership on these workshops allows for them to build relationships around more than recess playtime. One of my fifth graders said, you know, when I asked her, what is your thing these days? And I was expecting her to say, oh, I art or music. You know, she says, it's, you know, the collaborative work at Alpha. And I was like, what? But she really it has been such an opportunity for her to come into her own voice and connect with peers on a real peer level. Milana, I'm so glad you bring that up because I think that's one of the big concerns that I talk to parents all over the country. They're like, this all sounds great, but what about the socialization? And I think, really, what happens is people will equate quantity with, you know, quality of socialization, and that's not true at all. I actually think they get way more I I actually think they get more quantity. Like, they spend Yeah. More than half the day problem solving with their classmates, creating, imagining, you know, sort of, troubleshooting, doing all these really rich interactions as opposed to these little passing things over lunch or over recess. Yeah. It is just it's so much richer. It's amazing. What are some of the workshops that your kids have enjoyed? Our eight year old is loving the the flight workshop. So they're learning how to fly a plane through a simulator, and they have to make choices around weather and calibrations and which airport they're gonna have to choose to land at. So she is just kind of amazed by that entire thing. Our fifth grade twins are really, really loving a lot of the public speaking work that they're doing, and they're doing it in fun ways. So they're doing kind of a sketch comedy Saturday Night Live workshop. They're having to write TED Talks right now Mhmm. Which and they're watching all these TED Talks, you know, to get prepared. And they're just feeling as if, again, that finding of their own voice Yeah. And really taking it for a for a test drive is pretty cool. There's something so powerful to the point earlier about agency. When you have that level of buy in, from the student's perspective, the energy that follows as a result of that Yeah. And the enthusiasm for for showing up every day. It's a it's really a beautiful thing to see. Yeah. Yeah. You could. It it is a huge surprise. I I assume most out there will sort of go, when you say they love school, like, that's that's a sales pitch. And it's like, no. They they love school. We never they don't have to do homework, but it is very common for them to come home and, you know, relax for an hour and then crack open some sort of it's, you know, some sort of exercise or jazz. Needs with their very strange. Classmates to keep working on the workshops. They don't wanna stop. There are which is a longer conversation, but there are a number of hot moments at Alpha. The first was when the girls were about a month in, and you're like, hey. Do you wanna do this? And they're like, no. I'm sorry, dad. I've got a a Google Meet with my team in about twenty minutes. And they're like, oh, okay. I thought that was a line I used, but they use it now. Yeah. I will say also as a cautionary, a fifth grader with a tenth grade vocabulary is, it is something else. They're they're kinda good to hear. And with the twins, only one of them has gotten there so far, so she will turn to the other and say, that comment was superfluous. I'm like, you mean superfluous? And she's like, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Right. Let's not lord it over your sister just yet. So That's awesome. But they are having a blast. They love it. They now make us plan family vacations in order to not miss school. You were talking earlier about this. This is a routine every time we're like, hey. We're gonna go on this trip or this long weekend. First question from two of two of the three is, like, we're not gonna miss any school, are we? Because I can't I don't wanna go. We were talking about Universal Studios and they were like, we don't wanna go to Universal Studios if we have to miss Alpha. I was like, this is different than my upbringing. I think Alpha families quickly learn you can't catch that 03:00 Friday afternoon flight. You have to leave either later or Saturday morning, and it it happens on that. One thing I think people often kind of wonder too is, has what's been difficult about the transition? Anything challenging for any of your girls with the transition alpha? Oh, for sure. I think that the transition to agency Mhmm. The, the freedom and the ownership, it they they took to it pretty quickly with three. They took to it in different, you know, speeds. Yeah. One of our twins loves independence. One of our twins loves absolute structure. Right. And so she kept being like, am I? She would come home and she would say, I keep asking for instruction. And then I was like, can they tell you? And she was like, they tell me that I can decide. I'm afraid I'm gonna make the wrong choice. But what's the assignment? And what's the assignment? Yeah. Yeah. And you're sort of like, I don't like, we need to get you out of this. So, and the the coaches were great, in in the guides in in helping them work through that. I think that was a big switch. And then there was another unlock moment mentally when they realized that they could go at their own speed. Mhmm. And in certain instances, you know, they show up and they find out that they are, above level in certain subjects and behind level in others. Right? And they thought they were crushing it at their old school, but to show up and have these huge gaps Yeah. And then spend but but it was amazing how quickly they made up ground, right, and then exceeded the grade level. So that was that was pretty And I love the guides are so excellent at going, yes. This is going to be hard, but that's okay. We can do hard things. Mhmm. And that emphasis on grit and persistence and not simply being intimidated because it's a a big thing. And I think there's a lot of misunderstandings about confidence, and we've we've really enjoyed watching this with the girls. Confidence is not about a a false sense of confidence or about arrogance. It is about knowing when you show up that you can tackle things Yeah. And that it's a matter of effort and ability, but, like and now they show up, and that has very much been including when they showed up and in the subjects where they were behind level and going, yeah. But you can also dig yourself out of a hole. Like, this can be done. And then seeing them repeatedly doing it with collaborative support from the ecosystem and also without any shame. Right? So there's this, I think, performative mindset that can become toxic. And so when you get into a very healthy environment, you go, no. It's fine. Yeah. We're gonna get you there. Okay. There's nothing to be embarrassed about. Well, and that goes to the the personalized incentive models that get set up for every kid. So our girls meet with their guides one on one on a regular basis. They've never had teachers who can carve out that time to do that and understand what makes them tick and what they get really excited about intellectually and what's authentically them. And so now, when they show up every day, there isn't this, if I don't perform, there are negative consequences. Right? They don't deliver. It's more of if I'm able to really push myself, I can unlock really cool opportunities Yeah. And really cool sort of rewards. And and it just it's it's very much about what's possible as opposed to what you need to try and avoid or get away with. Which is a core Which is amazing. It's a core lesson that so many adults are still trying to figure out. Right. You know that that you get to you get to unlock. And if you get a a fifth grader to comprehend, if I just put in the work, right, these incredible things are are available to me. That's that's a beautiful, beautiful lesson. And it speaks very much to the that idea of high standards and high support, you know, knowing kids are capable of doing such big things and then having the guys be able to come alongside to say we're gonna help you with that. Yeah. We we can do this all day. Yeah. Yeah. No. One more one more question before we let you go. So you, where you are at in this journey right now, you've been in the system, your girls have gone through it. If you could go back and talk to yourself right at the beginning of your Connecticut flight over here, what would you say to yourself about this whole process for you? I think for us, we were excited about it, but, cautiously skeptical. Yeah. Because even after you've made the decision, after you think about it, you still think, okay, have I made a mistake? Is this really gonna be the way and the way experience the way the experience has been? And and for us, I would go back and say no. It's it's it's everything you hope for, and the girls are going to absolutely thrive. Yeah. They're gonna have great friendships. They're gonna have great experiences. They're gonna develop a vast range of life skills. And most importantly, you're gonna get an earlier and earlier preview of who they're gonna turn into as adults and watch them go through that journey, in the micro scale. And it's really been delightful in that sense. I think anytime you walk into a new paradigm, it's daunting. And for me, it was I'm used to school having this particular structure Mhmm. And including these certain elements. Right? And if you don't have those, you aren't having the full experience. And I think if if I could have told myself, go to first principles around what do you truly care about? What how how do you wanna see your girls come alive? What do you wanna be in their toolkit so they can take on big projects in the world? That would have made it really easy to go no. Alpha is geared toward all of the things that really matter for the girls to be bold and brilliant and brave and excited about taking on those big things. Would have been a very, very easy transition. Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing that story with not only us, but the families who are, looking at this whole process. That's incredible. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And now to that same regard, her girls, their girls are loving school. You heard it directly from the source. And that love of school piece is essential to the drive, to the agency, to to wanna show up every day. So we have a video that will kinda highlight that for you. Every day they come home from school, they're happy, they're excited to tell me about their day, they tell me about their goals, and it is pure joy and excitement the minute they come into the car. A few weeks back, he said, I wish it was Monday. Monday is when we go to school. Right? My head is just spinning because both of the kids genuinely would rather be at school than pretty much anywhere else. He was in a public TK program last year. It was hard getting him out the door some days. And now if I say, oh, no. We might miss the morning launch. Those shoes are getting on straight away. He is out the door. Instead of getting discouraged by setbacks, he's seen them as opportunities. You know, within the first week, he's been out rock climbing and learning all these amazing skills. That's the part that succeeded my expectations because that enrichment, I probably would have thought was on me to provide for him. I really know and I really feel that I'm putting our kids into the best school for them. I told Elliot that I was coming here to, give us a testimonial, and I said, well, is there anything that you want me to tell them? And he said, just tell them I love school. Okay. So how awesome are our parents? Unbelievable. Alana and Peter are great, and and we're so fortunate. We have just we have the best parent community in the world. They're incredible, but that is only beaten by our kids. Our kids are amazing, and we have Nadine joining us today. Nadine is a sixth grader, and she has been at Alpha her entire school career since, kindergarten. Nadine, thank you so much for being here. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited. Oh, it has been so much fun to watch you grow up and go through the alpha system. And I think, you know, one of the things that Jamal and I were talking about is, you know, we can talk about what alpha's like. You can hear parents explain this thing, but there's nothing like hearing it straight from source. Do that. Right. Yeah. Straight from the source because you're the one who's who's here day in and day out. And so, I'd I'd love to know what you kind of think of that. We at Alpha pride ourselves on being student centric. How do you think that Alpha listens to kids' voices, and and how do you have an ownership in your education? Yeah. So one of my favorite things about Alpha is that we students actually really get our voices heard here. So how we do this is once a week, we have this thing called town hall. So the week before town hall, students or guides can submit topics that they wanna talk about just kind of with the whole community. Just changes they wanna make to the community or some fun event or anything like that. And then on town hall day, the whole community will gather, so all the students and all the guides, and we'll go through topics that were brought up. So if students have a proposal for the topic, they can be like, I think they raise their hand. They're just like, I think we should do this. Mhmm. And then at the end of each topic, everyone will vote and will and then, they'll vote on whichever proposal or proposals they think should pass. And I think that this is just a really great way for us to get our voices heard. We've made lots of positive changes in our community. And yeah. What do you think have been maybe some hot button topics that have come up in town halls over the years? Okay. Let me think. Well, I mean, I think some of the most important topics have honestly been so we have this thing on our level, and it's called student council. So I think that's in a lot of regular schools, but we so we vote on student council, and we vote on it during town hall. So this may not seem like a huge deal, but the amount of members on student council is actually pretty important. If it's just two members, then there could be a lot for them to do and it could be overwhelming. Let's say there's five members. It could be, like, there's not enough to go around. So that was one of the topics that was brought up and we decided on four student council members. So we have one sixth grade member, one seventh grade member, one eighth grade member, and one from any. That way, just kind of, like, all the voices are getting heard, and it's not just all from one grade. It's, like, there's representatives from every grade. Yeah. I think town hall is something that, really does help students feel like I have ownership and agency over this culture. And one of the things I think we very much see is that when kids have that sense of ownership Yeah. You call yourselves and each other to just a higher standard, and you've also got really the buy in for for this because you've said, like, we as a community have made this decision to do something. And you have the ability to change your mind, you know, and come back, if it if it's something hasn't worked. And that's great. So the other thing we spend a lot of time at Alpha in, the afternoons is helping you find your passions and your interest. How do you think Alpha's helped you develop and and find the the things you love to do? Yeah. So I think Alpha was one of the main reasons that I discovered my passion for art and content creating and a lot of that, and it's also helped me pursue it a lot. So I don't know if you so if you know or if you don't know about the high school's AlphaX project, it's basically a super ambitious project that they work on in their four years of high school. So in my level, which is middle school, we have something called a mini AlphaX, which is exactly what it sounds like. It's a miniature version of the high school's really ambitious project. So we have a few things that we do to kind of help us work towards our we call it max project. So first of all, we get time. It's usually about forty minutes to an hour every single day to actually get to work on our Max projects, which is super cool. So they're not only encouraging us to create and work on, they're actually giving us time every single day to pursue and work towards it. And we also have something called a max check chart, which is basically just kind of a list of task a list of tasks that we, work on kind of to work towards, reaching the end goal in our max project and just moving towards toward in it. And I just think that they have Alpha has a really, really great system for not only helping students find their passions, but also just helping us pursue them and work towards. And so yeah. Yeah. I'll never forget, Nadine. This is a few years ago, and you may not remember this, but you and one of our other students, Tate, were talking about your jewelry businesses that you each had. You were each making your own jewelry. And I remember sitting and chatting with you, and you were saying, well, we each have different approaches to our businesses. I'm relying on more volume, and she's got higher prices. And we're kind of understanding how it goes. And you were literally talking about profit margin Yeah. And inventory and where you were selling and, you know, working on an Etsy store at one point. And your love for art has really been a shining example through all these years of knowing you. And I'll add to that. It's it's so funny watching, as you grow through this system and as you grow up, there's so many things that you've done that you've forgotten. And it's it's incredible. I remember about roughly three years ago, I needed a painting for a real estate project we were working on. Do you remember that? And I and I I went to Nadine, asked her for a painting, and and she charged me some steep prices. But I I did I wound up paying for it, and here we are four years later, and it's still hanging up. You know? And it's it's, like, you you've just done so many things time after time where a high standard is a low bar for you now. So could you just speak a little bit to, like, your your whole journey going through the all of this? Yeah. So I think that Alpha has given me a really great kind of foundation for just, like, building up my passions. In the beginning, I it was kind of less of a business and, like, less of a project to me. It was more of just kind of, like, something that I like to do in my free time. And I think that I've just built up a lot from that. It my project has changed a little bit. It's gone through, like, some changes. But I think that there have been lots of challenges, but I think that I've just, like, had pretty I've like, some of them were a little harder than others. But, I think that I've been able to, like, move forth and just kind of find a solution for a lot of the problems and just kind of having a really great mindset for moving, like, forward through the challenges is just really important. Now, Nadine, tell us about your guides, the relationship, and how that works. Because I think so many people will sit there and hear about alpha and they're like, wait. You have no teachers. What's that all about? Tell us about guides. Okay. Just to start off, I love our guides. They are literally just, like, the kindest and most like, some of the kindest and most supportive people, like, of all time. My favorite part about the guides is that they're less of teachers. So guides are actually there for emotional and motivational support, which I think is super cool because we actually get to connect with them, like, on a much deeper level. And if they were, like, teachers, like, we get to just kind of have a more personal connection. So, honestly, one of my favorite parts about the guides is that we each have kind of, like we get to know all the guides really well, but we each have, like, an individually, assigned guide to us. So my guide, she is, like, super kind and she's super supportive, and I think that's a really great personality match for me because I kind of like, the right guide for me is someone who is super kind, super supportive. So someone like that, but who can also kind of help push me. Mhmm. And another thing that I really like about the guides is we actually have these meetings with them one on one once a week. They're called limitless meetings. So it's basically just a time for, and it's one on one. So me and my guide, we just kind of like to talk about how the week is going, some things we'd like to improve on, and then for the rest of the time, we just talk about anything. Yeah. And it is so fun for me. I remember a few weeks ago, I was kind of struggling with a personal problem. So I talked to my guide about it. And first of all, she really listened to me, and she really just took in what I was saying. And she also offered advice and she was like, okay. You know what? Maybe you should do this. And the next few of those meetings, she kept checking in and she was like, hey, like, are you doing okay? And that just meant so much to me. Mhmm. I love that we can really get to know our guides personally. And so that is those are probably my favorite things. Yeah. Well, Nadine, I think you hit the nail on the head. The key to our success and the reason that Alpha is able to deliver these three commitments is because of our guides. Our guides are truly they're world class motivators. They are such experts at connecting with young people. And, what's happened in our model is we freed up the time that a teacher would normally be spending, you know, creating lectures and giving those lectures and grading papers and homework. And instead, we've said, okay. Let the technology handle the academic part of this, and you focus on motivating and connecting with kids. And they really are just absolutely Yeah. Hands down the best. So we're gonna watch this video that talks a little bit more about guides at Alpha. The guides are amazing. They genuinely care about the kids. They support them. Honestly, it has exceeded our expectations. The guides are supporting but not defining the direction. You can just tell that they love what they do. And to me, that makes all the difference. I'm just blown away all the time at the level of effort they put in. It's a 100% effort in everything they do, and it's really amazing. Your role is to have the kids love school. You can't do that by teaching everybody the same thing. So what essentially the guides are motivated to do is really learn about each individual child and their strengths and weaknesses. I think that's an underrated part of it is how deeply they care about understanding this particular child. I don't stress anymore about my son being in school because I know he has the guides and the support that he needs to do things on his own, and I want him to learn paving his own way. Nadine just blew me away. It's just it's so casual for her to be in this stage, in this environment, just talking about her story. And and if we're not careful, those kind of moments, you could take them for granted. It's really it's unbelievable just watching her Watching the growth in students is absolutely amazing. And I will tell you, it happened so quickly. And one of the things I wanna talk about is just we're not just seeing this magic happen in Austin. We're seeing this across the country, and we have got families that are joining us, alpha founding families coming in. We've got Martin from Santa Barbara. Hey, Martin. How are you? Hi, Mackenzie. I'm well. Thanks. Good to see you. And then Nancy and James are calling in from the Alpha San Francisco campus. I recognize that artwork. Hi. How are you? Hi there. It is so great to be able to come together. It's one of the things that I've just loved getting to know, families at all the different campuses and what the experience has been like for you. And, all three of you have something very much in common. You are founding families. That means that you are one of the first 25 families that has come in to a new city saying, we want something different for our kids' education. And I'm sure that that can feel a little bit intimidating. I know there's a lot of people who are are considering making that jump as alphas are expanding around the country. James, can you talk a little bit about, how you arrived at this decision and and what your experience has been like at Alpha? Sure. Happy to do that, Mackenzie. Yeah. We we arrived at this decision really based on, our experience at a traditional independent private school in San Francisco. You know, what really start what really was the catalyst was, you know, our we have an eighth grader, and a third grader. And, you know, throughout sixth through seventh grade, we started to see our son son's, sparkle in his eye dim. His interest in school was declining rapidly, and he just wasn't engaged anymore. And he was really bored. So that really started me down the the path of exploring other types of, you know, school platforms, alternative education, boarding schools, public schools. I was just open to any any other, modality, possible to try to, you know, jump start his his enthusiasm once again. And then I actually saw you, Mackenzie, on a on a podcast. I don't know if it was Hannah Frankman, you know, rebel educator or one of those, but I saw you talking about, you know, your mission to, help kids love school, to help them accelerate their learning and to to teach them life skills. And that really, peaked our interest and, that's when we started to do additional research, which led to actually doing, shadow days in Austin, Texas at the 2024 and early twenty five, in which, you know, we brought both of our kids to kinda sample what it's like, a day in the life of an alpha student. And, for our for our seventh grader at the time, immediately, his response to us was, we need to leave our current school, and I wanna come back. Wow. And, you know, we're in San Francisco, so it's not like something you can just, you know, flip the switch and and make it happen right away. There's a lot of moving parts, obviously. So, that's what, you know, led us here. And fortunately, in in July 2025, you guys made the announcement, which we're so thankful for. And trust me, my wife is even more ecstatic that that we didn't have to, you know, uproot the whole family. But it's something that we were willing to, you know, to contemplate was to to make a cross country move all, with the goal of helping our our sons, find their love of school again. Yeah. I remember, meeting you in San Francisco and you said we were thinking we're gonna move to Austin and now you're coming here. Thank you. That we it's easier for you to come to us, and that's wonderful. Now, Martin, I have to tell you about Martin. Martin single handedly brought Alpha to Santa Barbara. He reached out to me and said, hey. We have got to get this school here. Martin, I think you are the epitome of what it means to be a founding family, where you saw the vision and said, let's go. So tell me about how this experience has been and most of all, like, have we lived up to your expectations? Well well, I can answer the last question really simply. Yes. I mean, you've you've exceeded not just my expectations, but every single alpha parent in Santa Barbara, every single parent of every single student is blown away. And that's quite remarkable because we kind of approach this thinking, well, if 30% of what they say is true, that's amazing. And and it's self evident that, you know, Alpha is the future of education. That's why we're all here. That's why people are looking at the school or at the school because we all know the current education model is broken, and we all know that the world is changing rapidly. We know that the kind of children we need to bring into the world and the skills and competencies they have, they're they're just not receiving in traditional education. So the the overall concept is straightforward, but it's not until you actually have your child at alpha that you realize that everything they say is true and and so much more besides. I mean, you can't really associate to the level of motivation your children experience until they're in it. Like, for example, this notion of loving school. Well, you just kinda discount it. Love school. Who who really loves school? You know, I'll I'll walk out in the morning and it's dark and it's 06:00 in the morning and my son is working because he wants to, you know, get his XPs, which is a unit of measurement that they have. This whole notion of crushing academics, you know, you crush grapes. You don't crush academics. Academics are a serious thing that you sort of have to, you know, put a lot of dedication to. But candidly, that's my son's mindset, you know. I I don't mind saying. My son is really bright and really lazy. Well, not any longer. And since he went since he started going to alpha school, the the dedication that he's had to excelling academically and to competing with his friends, but in in a in a collegiate sense. Mhmm. Like, they're all in it together and and and it's just extraordinary. So the parents are over the moon because the way their children are showing up, loving school, racing out the house in the morning, and and the way in which, you know, that they're motivated, you you you just can't really you can hear it a lot, but when your children are experiencing it, they show up and they present and they embody something entirely different to the child that they were before they went to Lava. Well, it has been so much fun. I got to catch up with Theo when I was in Santa Barbara recently and he was like, Mackenzie, what? Who can I talk to? How can I tell about how great this is? And he was really, it was just amazing to see that spark and that glow. And, you know, that's the thing that that pushed me to want something different for my own girls is having that enthusiasm and that excitement and and that sparkle, and it's amazing. Nancy, what would you say is the biggest transformation you've seen with your boys through this school year? What have been some of the highlights? Big highlight for my little one, Austin. They did a, project where well, not project, but they did rock climbing as one of their activities. Austin, my little one, was the only one that did not pass, but he had one week completed. Yeah. So I brought him to the rock climbing facility, and, I probably bought him for three days. He kept falling. I have videos of him falling falling, and he just kept getting up, trying. I said, okay, sweetheart. We can try it tomorrow. He said and he said, okay. We'll try tomorrow. And so I kept bringing him, and the day that I the third day that I did bring him, I brought big brother with him. And, he was there to support his little brother, and he finally climbed the V 2. Amazing. It was amazing. And I had it all on video, and he was like, send it to Derek. Send it to Derek. You know, I wanted I want him to know that I passed. Yeah. So he was able to I don't know. That that was one big moment for my little one, and I was just like you just feel the butterflies of just, like, him just learning grit and just not giving up. Yeah. The joy that they feel in those moments where they overcome failure and and kinda learn that failure is not the it's not the opposite of success. It's a part of it. Right? It's it's it's on that journey. Right? It's it's such a beautiful thing to just witness in real time. Yeah. I think it is exciting to see that. And I remember, James, talking to you, you know, this summer, one of the things that you had had told me was that at your previous school, you know, you had said the boys were bored, and the school's answer was sort of like, well, they're already performing really well, so that's just the way it is. They're not supposed to grow that much when they're already as high performing as they are. And, we were having a conversation recently when I was in San Francisco where you said, hey. It's been interesting to see some of the holes that they need to go back and catch up on in, you know, grade content, but also that sense of feeling like they've got power and ownership to be able to, you know, really take ownership of of that academic journey. How has the academic experience been for you? It's been just fantastic and transformative. And, Mackenzie, you you I always remember you, you always speak about how, you know, competence leads to confidence. Mhmm. And that is so true. You know, both of our boys, came in, took their placement testing and then map testing. And, when we got the results, it was a very sobering reality check. Because these were a students at this, you know, school. They were a students and yet there were some holes that they had in that traditional education model. Right. Our eighth grader in in sixth and seventh grade, he was getting straight a's. Mhmm. And, you know, we were doing math testing previously, and the school's position was, hey. He's a great student. He's already, you know, top of the class. You know, he shouldn't be growing, all that much since he's already an 88 percentile student. And, you know, it it was very dismissive, and their approach was such that, you know, he's doing great. But the placement testing and the map testing at Alpha definitely told a different story, and it was quite alarming. And, you know, there were there were tears that were shed because it it's hard to, you know, come to terms with that. But we encourage our our our eighth grader to just, you know, focus on moving forward and focus on, utilizing Alpha's methodology and system because it's the data that you've, so readily, shared with everybody with your radical transparency. It it really does, you know, show that it works. And, our our both of our boys just actually took their reading portion of the map test, this week. They've only done one module. Mhmm. And, we we just spoke to Carson, their one of their guides, and, he he was all smiles, you know. It already showed a a significant increase above their goal, which was their goal from their prior MAP test in, in in in September to the MAP test in the winter, and, they far exceeded their goal. So That's incredible. Well, I'm excited to see more of that. And, Nancy, James, and Martin, I can't thank you enough for being willing to be a part of the founding families group in San Francisco and Santa Barbara. I love visiting both of those places, so you're gonna see me again out there. But thank you for joining us tonight too. Sounds great. Aren't they amazing? I'm telling you, these parents are awesome. They're absolutely great. Yeah. And and I think there's something so powerful about the fact that time and time again, you've heard when I first met you three years ago, right, you hear a family say, Alpha's great. I want it in San Francisco. Alpha's great. I want it in Miami. And which is why this whole scale kind of phase that you've entered in now where you've literally taken this thing coast to coast all the way from Santa Barbara, California to just a family in San Francisco, Miami, Florida. So could you talk a little bit about what that means for the families who are who are considering you now? Yeah. I think one of the things that's been really exciting is just to see how this has spread. It's like alpha fever has spread around the country because when when families finally realized, wait a second. My kid doesn't have to sit in class doing academics all day plus homework at night, and they can, you know, as Martin said, crush their academics and then do life skills. I think it starts making people kinda go like, wait a second. You know, what am I doing? We need to come in here. And so, they're such a great example of the founding families that have really said, hey. We're gonna bring an alpha to our city. And so we've opened up numerous, schools throughout the country, and we're continuing to do that. Now our families are doing incredible things. They're helping us with finding real estate. They're helping us with spreading the word for for hiring, you know, local staff that were there. They're spreading the word with their families, and, and it's been a really wonderful thing. One of the questions that we often get asked is, you know, what happens? How do you make sure that quality doesn't suffer as you scale? And I think that is a very legitimate and important question. And, Joe and I, who's the principal, we are adamant that we will not ever sacrifice quality for scale. And what we're actually finding that's really interesting is the inverse, which is our scale is actually helping with our quality. So that's everything from being able to hire the world's best learning science team who is implementing all the research that has shown how kids can learn faster, better to mastery, and being able to put that in because they realize this is gonna impact a lot of students, not just one small school here in Austin, Texas or something like that. We're also getting the most incredible guides. We had 80,000 people apply for our guide roles 80,000. Since last spring. Wow. And I think that also speaks to the fact that, you know, people who are passionate about building their careers Mhmm. You know, working with students, they wanna have the impact that I think the alpha model allows them to have, like, maybe even talked about. That time to really connect, with that. We've been able to see this. But then the other thing that's really exciting is, the family network that is being created throughout all of, the country. And so we're seeing alpha families from, you know, New York and Palm Beach and Orange County who are getting to connect and really, you know, come together. But even more exciting than that is what the kids are getting to do. So, for example, we had our kids from San Francisco went and spent five days in New York doing a big coding AI hackathon challenge. We had kids from our, sports academy and alpha school, you know, going to Miami doing a sailing workshop. We have kids that are working all across the place. Some of our students from Austin are heading, up to Chicago to do an event up there, and they're gonna meet students from New York. So all of those cross campus collaboration opportunities, I think, are really exciting, especially when you imagine, like, you know, you're you're gonna have a seventh grader who's like, hey. I've got friends in all these different cities that I'm connected with through Alpha. Yeah. That's something that's exciting. And then I will say, selfishly, as a parent, one of the other cool kind of opportunities that's coming up upon us with having this national network is that, families have the ability to spend a session in a different city. So we've got families who are saying, hey. We're gonna go to Dorado, Puerto Rico, you know, for the wintertime. We're gonna go to Palm Beach for this time. We're working on a on a mountain town where where people can go do a ski ski park for that. And so that's one of the things that has been really, really exciting. That's incredible. Just the national kind of impact of all of this. So, in addition to that, so the kids, they're they're the core, the benefactors of all this, and it it always gets back to them. And one of the things that we talked about earlier is kinda the importance of life skills. So one family that we're super excited to talk with, one mom in particular, doctor Dalian, all the way from Miami. So we're gonna talk with her and her daughter's experience in this life skills curriculum that we've developed, and so excited about that. Hi. How are you? Hi. Can you hear us okay, everyone? Doing great. How are you? Doing great. I can hear you. Doing great. Doing great. So you're you're a doctor and you evaluate evidence for a living. Can you can you speak to as you were hearing about alpha, as you were thinking about the model, what was the moment where it clicked for you or like, yeah. I'm I'm putting my daughter in this? Well, you know, I'm a physician, so I learned early in my career that when you understand patient needs and when you personalized health care and then you give them the support that they need, the outcomes change. So what really, really draw me to alpha, it was just thought that you guys were using AI. That was something so cool and so new. Right? It was just that seeing that what you guys were doing. You guys were getting to know the kid. You guys were personalizing the education specifically for them, and then you were using just guiding them, the guys to coach them and guide them, and providing them with the environment that they need for them to be able to thrive. Right. Right. And also have the the proximity that's the the the other kids doing the same thing as them. That was what really, really drove me into that. I'm like, wait. This is very similar to, you know, health care. Yeah. And and Kenzie and I have talked about that before. But you know what? My moment, that came when you know, like, my daughter, we she struggled a lot with math, for years. And so we did tutoring and all these things, and I I we couldn't understand why she was struggling so much with math, but she was getting eight MBs. And it was until she got into outside and she had a placement test that, they find out that she has a lot of gaps starting from fourth grade and my daughter starting seventh grade. Believe that she wasn't happy about it. She was she was she was upset at the beginning. So so she wasn't happy to going back and filling those and knowledge gap that she had. But what happens next, again, she was she was totally happy at the beginning, but she started pulling up those gaps. And and I think that what the biggest thing was that she understood why she was having a hard time. Mhmm. And that, as she went, you know, learning and then filling those gaps and advancing, she became more confident. Right. Right. So now I I can't do it. You know what I mean? So and and also, the way she saw learning changed. Like, identity as a learner changed as well. So I think that was my moment. That's awesome. And and the beauty of the academic portion of the day that you just discussed is it's in two hours, which frees up four to now do those life skills, like financial literacy, like public speaking, like those universal skills. It doesn't matter what industry you step into. You're you're gonna need them. Can you speak a little bit about her experience with some of those workshops that she's done and the life skills that you've seen on full display? Okay. So one of the the the things that I love the most about it was the workshop that you guys were doing. And and I wanna speak about, like, the greatest, both really, because for us, that was that was, let's say, some that that was quite surprising. We're not expecting this one. So she did a TED talk last last year. TED talk. And a real TED talk. Real TED talk. Yeah. Not like a fake TED talk. A real TED talk. Go on YouTube and look at TED talk. To buy for. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And we didn't see that coming. She was, like, seven months in, you know, when she she started, alpha school. And, she preparing six weeks. So and then she did it. She did wonderful. That's something that's that us as an adult, like, I I can't tell you. I can be honest. Like, I'm I get nervous when I go on stage. But she she did it. But I'm so proud of her for doing that because she did so well. But that speaks loudly about the work that you guys are doing. Why? Because that's what we saw that moment. Oh, look. This 12 year old doing the TED talk doing it. But what happened before was what enabled her to be able to do that. Right? Yeah. I I didn't see that coming. I didn't see that in her. It was the guide that saw, hey. She she likes that. She has the potential to do it, and then prepare her, dye her, try to help her figure out what's the message that she cares about and she could bring in and then help her understand that her voice matters and that she can share her ideas. So that all that happened for her to be able to understand that, hey. I can do this. Sally Ann, I remember when I first met Penny when I came to Miami, and this was in, like, November. She had started in November, and she was she was shy and she was a little bit little bit nervous and just apprehensive. And then I remember coming back in about January or February, and, we had some very, you know, kind of prominent people who were touring the school. And I just asked Penny, hey, Penny. Would you be willing to, you know, give a quick talk to to our guests that are here? And Penny kind of looked at me and she said, I'm I'm a little nervous, but I can do it. I know I can do this. And I saw that growth mindset in her, and she went out and she just did such an amazing job of talking very authentically and professionally and really doing it improv, you know, with no notice whatsoever. And then watching her on that stage when she traveled to Austin to be on that TED Talk, I had tears in my eyes. I know you and your husband did too. It was amazing. And then on top of it, the the topic she was talking about, which was about using authentic voice, around, you know, emoji culture, you know, in social media, it was such an incredible moment. And I will tell you that TED TEDx talk, there were 11 speakers. Nine of those speakers that had been approved by the TED organization to speak were alpha students. And, it was a really, really incredible event to see, just how much Penny grew in such a short period of time. Yeah. It's truly unbelievable. Yeah. Truly unbelievable. Sitting in that audience, Mackenzie and I both, I I just I vividly remember just watching her in this moment of, like, you're 12 years old and you can for the rest of your life, you have this. You you did a TED talk at that age, at that place in your life. And she's got more to do. Yeah. She's only 13. So what's she gonna do next? Well, thank you so much for being here, doctor Dalian. It's such a pleasure. You were also a founding family in Miami, and, it has been wonderful to see that campus grow from when there were six kids to now I think we're over 80 at this point. So thank you for being here. Mhmm. Thank you for having me. That that, TEDx talk that those students did was so amazing, and I think it's it's just one example of just all the cool things kids can do. And I think a lot of times, you know, families will come maybe for the academics, but they stay for the life skills. Yeah. And we've got a great video that we wanna show you that's just a highlight, of some of the life skills workshops that have happened across our campuses this past fall. Check it out. Across the country, alpha workshops culminate in a real world test that measures life skills in action. In San Francisco, students tested their grit and determination to do hard things by biking across the Golden Gate Bridge and back without stopping. My legs hurt. So I can do it. Others took the stage. Welcome, everyone. Today, we're diving into the totally iconic And some became inventors, designing and building real AI tools, then explaining how they worked and defending their ideas under pressure. In Texas, students ran a full sailing regatta, rigging boats, rotating captains, navigating independently, and making decisions together under pressure. Other students face survival challenges, first aid, fire, shelter, and navigation. In Palm Beach, students completed a Navy Seal led aquatic rescue I pulled Sean 25 yards. Battling fatigue, pressure, and the clock in a full scope water mission. In Santa Barbara, students entered the Pacific, surfing, free diving, and forecasting conditions. In Orange County, students entered the intensity of a professional kitchen, operating as a full chef brigade under a surprise menu and tight deadline. Olivia, you're gonna start off the apple. I'm gonna start the chest with that side. Let's go. And in Scottsdale, students took on a learn to learn challenge. They learned to write music, produce original tracks, and perform live. I'm gonna It makes me feel more confident about myself. The test to pass is how alpha measures growth and mastery. I think those kids had a lot of fun over the past fall, and, of course, our guys are always cooking up more adventures for them. It's unbelievable. I that's that's always been one of the things that have just been so, consistent amongst parent reactions across the country is just life skills. I I want my kid to have public speaking. I want my kid to have critical thinking. I want my kid to have financial literacy. And and seeing those life skills on full display in a intentional way Mhmm. All the way from kindergarten beyond. It's just it's really beautiful. Yeah. And I actually think we've we've really grown so much in our life skills workshops because, you know, you have to make sure, first of all, that there is, a workshop that the kids enjoy. Yeah. Right? You if you wanna do it they wanna they've gotta wanna do it. So it's gotta be something that they enjoy and that's fun and hard. And then the other part is what is the life skill that you're actually teaching and how are you making sure that kids are learning those life skills? And one of the things I always say is, you know, if you're teaching grit, we don't just hand kids grit by Angela Duckworth and say, read this book and write a report on it. We instead have them do something that's challenging. So our kindergarteners who are riding their bikes five miles or, you know, our our fourth and fifth graders who are doing a tough mudder, you know, and our and our older kids who are doing these, you know, these other things, like, that's where you really show that, and it's finding that that combination. And I think that's so much of the magic from from a social perspective, from a mentorship perspective, you know, and and from really growing these kids to develop those skills. Powerful. Very powerful. So on a slightly different slightly different note. So I'm I'm a parent. Right? I'm a parent, and I've seen you in future of education. I've seen alpha all over the world, and I wanna figure out how to bring this to my city. What do I need to do? What are the next steps? Yeah. I mean, that's one of the things that I think has been, again, just so exciting is to see families say, hey. I want this. And, you know, Martin was a great example that we saw tonight. He really did say, I am going to be part of what's bringing this this year. And, and so, we've been really fortunate to have families that are proactive in saying, okay. I'm gonna gather the interested people. We have so much content that's out there for people to learn. Right? Like, the last thing that I need is another info session with me. Right? Or another podcast that Joe has done. There's so much of that. And so, basically, what what families are doing is saying, okay. If I'm gonna gather these other people that I want my kid to to be in in school with, let's help them learn about this. And then, you know, from a practical perspective, they can go on the website. There's a form that says bring Alpha to My City. We also are opening schools that we've already announced where we've seen that demand. We won't open a school until we've got 25 students, that are enrolled and ready to go. So some of the schools that we've just announced recently, will, you know, come out in August. And we're seeing great demand. And then, of course, the next step in that is finding out if Alpha is the right fit for your family. And so kids will go through a shadow day experience, where, you know, our guides come to that city and they complete the shadow day to understand, you know, if it's a fit, for kids, and then kind of going. And I think, you know, parents parents get so excited about what this looks like, but then it's like, are they really gonna take the leap and do that? And it's been really fun to see just that wave catch on as parents start realizing, okay. This isn't an experiment. This isn't new anymore. This is something that's got proven results, and that's one of the reasons we're so transparent about all of our results, everything from, you know, our MAP scores and our assessments to our parent survey results, our student survey results, all of those things, you know, in order to do that. Because I think a school should be a place that is transparent. It is serving the family and those those children. So, that's what they can do. And there'll be information around how you can, you know, jump into your city. Awesome. Awesome. Love to hear it. So given that this event is virtual, we are so excited to do live questions and real answers Yay. With Mackenzie. We just so you know, Mackenzie has a very active presence on social media. So anytime you have a question, she loves them. She loves getting feedback. She loves receiving feedback. So just feel free to add it to the chat, add it to her on Instagram, shoot her a direct message. She loves that kind of thing. So the first one that we have, if you could choose one thing for every school in the world to implement tomorrow, what would it be? Oh, okay. So I think everyone might expect that I was going to say AI, you know, to be like a patient, but that's not actually what I would say. Yeah. Here's the thing that I wish that every school in the world would implement is a focus on motivation. Mhmm. Motivating students because, you know, in order to be a great learner, 10% of what creates a great learner is being given academic material at the right level and the appropriate pace for a student to learn. And and that's where our technology does do a really good job at that and is able to to do that even better than, you know, a teacher who's trying to group students or manage, you know, a a lot of varying, levels of that. But 90% is you have to have a motivated student. And, you know, at Alpha, we believe that if a child is not thriving in our system, it's our fault. It's the school's issue. It's not because the kid is, you know, not wanting to do it. Our guides need to figure out how to motivate. And I think that when you can connect with a kid and get them turned on to the idea of learning and growing and doing something and finding out what's that passion that they love. You know, what is that thing? And for us, that's everything from, you know, kids getting paid alpha bucks in order to hit their academic goals to earn abilities to go to an escape room, you know, or having a, a lunch with their guide, a special, you know, lunch brought in with their guide, whatever that is, all the way to, you know, earning more independence where they get to, you know, go sit in the rocket ship room, you know, when they hit their goals. It's finding those connections, and I think that schools could provide, that motivation connection. It it it's a game changer. Yeah. It's it's simple, but it's profound. Get the kid to want to do the thing. Right? Right? Which it's powerful, and I I think it is such an understated thing about alpha. All the the plethora of ways in which you attack motivation. You're gonna do it from the perspective of the guide and the mentor in that room. You're gonna do it from the incentives that you have in in the model. You're gonna do it from the awesome workshops in the back half of the day. It's it's really beautiful. Another question that we have is so we keep hearing age grade, knowledge grade. Talk to me about that. What's the difference between those two things? Yeah. So, you know, traditional school environment, we all grew up in it, and we think, okay. I'm a fifth grader. You know, I'm 11 years old. It's time for me to be in fifth grade, and that is your age grade. Mhmm. And at Alpha, we believe it's really important for kids to get to hang out with other kids in their age grade. Right? And so that's an important part of of having their peer group, you know, that they're connected with on there. But knowledge grade is a very difficult differ Difficult. Knowledge grade is a very different, thing. And what it is is basically understanding what does a student know. And some of our parents mentioned that there was, a big disparity between their kids' age grade and knowledge grade. Now sometimes you get kids who come in and they're years ahead, you know, and they're they're able to work on that. In fact, that's one of the things I love about the academic model at Alpha is that the sky is the limit. There are no shackles and there's no such thing of a kid being told, hey. You're already too far along in math. You need to just chill out a little bit. Or even worse, you know what? You're in this math. You need to march down the hall and go hang out with older kids while you're doing your algebra class. Right? I mean, they can do that. But I will tell you the thing that's really crazy, and James and Nancy spoke to this when they were they were talking, is we onboarded hundreds of students, this past fall in the 2025. And, these are students who are coming in from, you know, nice schools, and they were a students on their transcripts. They're b students. They were coming in, when we assessed them. Mhmm. The average was 2.2 grade levels behind. Oh. Yeah. And you know what? Parents' kids are like, wait a second. What? They really are like, oh my gosh. I was not getting an accurate picture of what my kid was because, you know, grades mean nothing anymore. Mhmm. There's there's rampant grade inflation. Teachers basically have a choice of getting out a's and b's. C's, d's, f's have basically become a thing of of the past. So that can be very scary and frustrating. Now here's the good news, and we just saw this through the results we're at midyear. Those students, 2.2 grade levels, behind, are all on track to be ahead of grade level Wow. By the end of the school year. Wow. Putting in the time, two hours for some kids, they if they're really behind, they may may need to spend an extra hour of catch up, you know, in order to do this, but to be able to get them forward. And so I think that's the the thing, the kind of pain point from an academic perspective that we're building out. It's also, how when we take kids' knowledge grades and we get them up to their age grade level, they've got mastery and that makes the rest of their learning journey Yeah. A lot easier. I, you know, I always say the worst time to be learning chem to to be learning algebra is in your chemistry class. Right? And the worst time to be learning calculus is in your AP physics class. Yeah. And this is where that mastery model of education is really making a difference. Yeah. When you first hear a two x in two hours, it might seem like kind of a daunting big thing. But the second you get into the model and you see in real time, it's all about meeting the kid exactly with what they need Yeah. Then it makes perfect sense that they would grow at an accelerated rate because it's it's customized to them. That's that's so beautiful. Yeah. Now the third piece that we've had from our audience here is I'm looking at alpha and I want it to be a part of the first 25. I'm concerned about the size. Does school size matter for socialization? What about that first hump? Talk to us about that. Yeah. Well, Alana did such a great job of kind of bringing up, I think the richness of the socialization that our kids are getting at Alpha. First of all, they just get more time and more intentional time to really connect, on this. And so I again, I think a lot of parents, we think of, well, socialization just means having more kids and what we see is the quality of these relationships and the engagement. The other thing that I think that Alpha really focuses on is giving kids coaching and development in socialization and relationship building, and so they get a much richer experience. You know, traditional school, like it or not, you know, it's sort of a jump in and see how you do. I hope I hope you survive. I hope you're able to get this, but there's not a lot of of coaching around that. And we start from an early age when whether it's in kindergarten where we're teaching kids how to play a game fairly and take turns to as they grow up, how to do how to give and receive feedback, how to be interesting to other people, and how to be interested in other people. Right? And then, of course, how to be creators, and contributors, not consumers, which is such an important skill that we need our young people to learn, especially in this increasingly digital world that we're in. How do you make sure that kids are really jumping and doing that? So I think for, you know, families that are saying, hey. I love the idea of alpha, but I I'll wait until it's a little bigger. The biggest thing I hear from people is they're like, why didn't I make this change Yeah. Sooner? I should've jumped in sooner. One of the great privileges I've been able to witness is in real time seeing a parent community just find kinda like minded people. Just just like, hey. I I know that education is this, but there's an opportunity to make it better. And when when all those parents get together, it's like an army. They could they could take on the world with their enthusiasm, positivity. You heard it today on on from our our parent testimonials about just what's possible in the future of education. So exciting. Now the last question that we most consistently get from many parents is, I want a proof of concept. I hear what you're saying about a kindergartner, and I see Nadine here, and she's speaking so eloquently. But what does this look like from start all the way to finish? Who's graduated, and what are they doing now? Yes. That's a a common question as people are saying, well, you know, first of all, are they able to graduate and get into college? Are they able to go out and do this? How do they assimilate when they're back into a traditional environment? Whatever it is. The short answer is that they are crushing it. It has been wonderful. And we've got one last video that we wanna show you before we sign off, that shows you a little bit of where some of our alpha graduates are now. Check it out. Parents often ask what comes after alpha. Can graduates get into great universities, adapt to traditional classrooms, and truly thrive academically? In traditional school, you're a lot more used to having a super structured day. But at Alpha, obviously, you learn how to make your own schedule and you do things through your own initiative. Colleges felt like an extension of what I had already been doing at Alpha, which was being able to take ownership over your own education. And that's just something that I think I've done a lot better due to Alpha's ethos. So the number one mindset I got from Alpha was the limitless mindset. I came into college with a really strong sense of self, a lot of determination and belief in yourself that you can go and you can achieve these things if you put your mind to it. Being at art school, one of the most valuable skills and mindsets that I receive from going to Alpha is growing from feedback and not fearing it. And without Alpha, I 100% would have not gotten into Stanford, so I will always always be grateful for that. Thank you so much for joining us tonight and seeing what life at Alpha can offer. If you're ready to explore applying to one of our campuses or want to experience Alpha in person, the links are available for you right here. We can't wait to welcome you and show you an incredible journey and and what your child could could take away from all of this. Mackenzie? This has been so fun. This has been a blast. We have a great time when we hang out together. We should do this, like, every week. I also got to kind of experience my Today Show host, you know, childhood dream of doing that, except we're doing it evening time, and, Austin's waiting for us. But Yeah. Thanks for being a part of the future of education with me. This was fun. Having me. Yes. For having me. Take care, guys.