San Francisco private school using AI instead of teachers to teach students

By Da Lin

A school in San Francisco is changing how students learn by making artificial intelligence central to their education.

For 13-year-old June Rockefeller, her school experience will be different starting this year.

“I love school so much now. I think it’s just really fun,” she said.

Rockefeller is part of the inaugural class at Alpha, a new school in San Francisco that’s using AI and removing bells, grades and even teachers. AI handles the lessons, and adults are called guides and coaches, who are there to help with “motivational and emotional support.”

Students spend just two hours on core subjects, all taught by AI-powered apps, which, according to the school, do not have chat functionality. Instead, the AI uses a “vision model to watch the screen and coach … on how to learn more effectively.”

The rest of the day is used for hands-on life skills and passion projects, the school said. Ethan Wong, 14, was using AI to design an app for molecular gastronomy. On this day, he learned how to pitch his startup to investors.

“I really enjoy spending less time doing academics and spending more time doing things I love,” Wong said.

His dad, James Wong, admits he wasn’t sure about the experiment until he saw it in action.

“I had not seen that smile when he exited school in a very long time,” James said.

Carson Lehmann, Alpha’s lead guide, said education has been slow to change.

“I want them to see that they can create something, they don’t need any other skills, they don’t need a crazy degree in computer science, they are able to create a functioning app,” he said.

“What needs to be made really clear is that some of the consequences of unregulated and currently unstudied AI in education settings could have potentially really impactful and negative effects on our students,” said Cassondra Curiel, president of United Educators of San Francisco.

And then there’s the price, $75,000 a year, more than many Ivy League schools. Alpha claims students at its other campuses score in the top one to two percent nationally across all grade levels.

The school started with just 15 students, but next fall it aims to enroll 75, with scholarships open to some families. And for Rockefeller, there’s no going back.

“It’s high standards, but it doesn’t stress me out,” she said.