Alpha School Cuts Class to Two Hours with AI to Train Teen Founders

Alpha School借助AI将上课时间缩短至两小时，以培养青少年创业者 随着人工智能将学科教学压缩至每天两小时，学校必须从被动听讲转向现实世界的创业实践，以帮助学生为自动化系统消除初级企业职位的经济环境做好准备。 Alpha School创始人Joe Liemandt与HAA联合创始人Gagan Biyani同Erik Torenberg展开对话，阐述了AI驱动的自适应学习如何将核心学术课程压缩至每天仅需两小时，从而将全天的其余时间解放出来，用于开展团队协作和公开演讲等实际生活技能研讨。他们将这一理念延伸至高等教育，认为传统大学因被动听讲、行政机构臃肿和学生参与度下降而陷入困境。相比之下，现代大学阶段的项目应以实战创办公司、内在动机和同伴网络为核心。在通过1910年代的高中运动等历史类比回应家长的质疑时，他们强调教育必须主动出击，培养坚定的行动力和激发更高的抱负，而不仅仅是为过时的文凭进行优化。 Alpha School通过自适应AI学习引擎将核心学术掌握压缩至每天两小时，将其余上学时间用于生活技能和团队协作研讨，同时使学生的标准化考试成绩始终保持在前1%。 (0:00) 一项针对来自麻省理工学院、斯坦福大学和德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的70多名精英大学实习生的调查显示，仅有一名学生认为自己的大学正在为应对受AI重塑的就业市场做好充分准备。 (15:08) Joe Liemandt以颠覆农业就业并推动现代高中运动的1910年凯斯拖拉机作为历史类比，认为生成式AI要求对中学和高等教育进行同样大胆的重新设计。 (25:00) Alpha高中推出了一项创业项目，要求高中生在毕业前创造100万美元利润，该项目提供全额学费返还保证，并设有从100美元起步的渐进式里程碑等级。 (50:00)

Alpha School founder Joe Liemandt and Horowitz and Andreessen Academy co-founder Gagan Biyani argue that artificial intelligence and cognitive science can compress traditional academics into two hours a day, requiring education to be rebuilt around student agency, collaborative problem-solving, and practical entrepreneurship. Compressing Academics and the 80–85% Mastery Zone (10:00) Traditional instruction relies on a uniform classroom pace that risks boring advanced students or leaving struggling ones behind. Liemandt explains that Alpha School uses an adaptive learning engine driven by cognitive science and large language models to decouple age from academic levels. This software targets an 80% to 85% accuracy band—deploying scaffolding lessons if accuracy falls below 66% to prevent frustration, while accelerating difficulty when work is too easy. According to Alpha's internal data, this model allows students to complete core curriculum in two hours daily while testing in the top 1% on standardized tests. Reallocating the School Day to Real-World Life Skills (0:00) Because core instruction requires only two hours, Alpha dedicates the afternoon's remaining four to five hours to practical life skills: leadership, financial literacy, relationship building, storytelling, and grit. Rather than relying on standard group projects where one student does all the work, Alpha uses AI tools to diagnose and train collaboration. For instance, third graders in an escape room have their spoken language analyzed by an AI engine; after an eight-week workshop focused on constructive communication, teams that raised their collaborative language score to 85% solved the challenge three times faster. In fourth and fifth grade, students are tasked with passing a Wharton MBA Mount Everest challenge that half of adult business school students fail. The Breakdown of Higher Education and Project-Based Alternatives Biyani and Liemandt contend that traditional universities have become broken bundles where students routinely abandon 100-series lectures—citing attendance drops below 10%—while administrators spend up to 90% of their energy on faculty politics and bureaucracy. During an Alpha summer program with over 70 interns from institutions like MIT and Stanford, only a single student believed their university was adequately preparing them for an AI-altered workforce. Instead of classroom problem sets, the cohort voluntarily logged 80-hour weeks designing an open-source educational language model. Biyani argues that learning is 90% motivation, which is ignited by shipping software and building viable products rather than completing abstract coursework. Early Adopters and the 1910 Agrarian Disruption Analogy (25:00) Liemandt compares the current disruption from generative AI to the arrival of the mechanized tractor around 1910, which displaced roughly 30% of the agricultural workforce and prompted American communities to fund secondary high schools from scratch. While high school parents close to graduation often default to conventional college pipelines, elementary parents are actively seeking alternatives. Both Alpha and HAA utilize 'magnet marketing' to attract early cohorts with high conviction while filtering out skeptical laggards, noting that early resistance in new campuses reliably dissolved once initial cohorts produced strong outcomes. Cultivating High Ambition Through Milestone-Driven Entrepreneurship (50:00) To build resilience against shifting corporate headcounts, Alpha teaches entrepreneurship starting in kindergarten with an internal currency, culminating in a high school capstone where students are challenged to generate $1 million in business profit backed by a tuition refund guarantee. Freshmen progress through earning tiers ($100, $1,000, $10,000, and $100,000) while practicing high-stakes networking—such as a 14-year-old student cold-calling Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, who critiqued his preparation. Citing economist Tyler Cowen, Liemandt notes that an educator's primary duty is elevating a student's personal ambition, which HAA mirrors by placing undergraduates directly alongside prominent tech operators to demystify success. While these accelerated models report high student satisfaction and rapid academic progress, institutional scaling remains tethered to parent psychology and overcoming century-old expectations around traditional credentials.

Alpha School 创始人 Joe Liemandt 与 Horowitz and Andreessen Academy (HAA) 联合创始人 Gagan Biyani 认为，人工智能驱动的自适应学习引擎能在每天两小时内完成核心学术教学，倒逼学校彻底重构教学日程；教育机构应从灌输知识转向以真实项目、创业实践与自主能动性为核心的实战培养。 AI自适应引擎重塑K-12作息 (0:00) 传统学校一个世纪以来依赖单向讲授，效率低下。Liemandt 指出，Alpha 结合认知科学与大语言模型构建自适应学习引擎，使学生掌握核心学术内容的速度提升数倍，每天仅需两小时即可实现两倍于常规六小时教学的学业进展，并在标准化考试中位居前1%。该引擎将学生的答题准确率严格锚定在 80% 至 85% 的区间内；若准确率过高则加大难度，跌破 66% 则触发脚手架补卡课程以防学生产生挫败感。 由于学术学习被大幅压缩，学校腾出下午的四到五个小时专门开展软性技能工作坊，涵盖领导力与团队协作、创业与财商、社交能力、公开演讲及坚毅品质。内部调查显示，Alpha 超过 90% 的学生表示热爱上学，50% 甚至表示宁愿上学也不去度假。为解决传统团队作业分工失衡的问题，学校自三年级起将学生放入密室逃脱，利用 AI 转录音频并量化建设性沟通占比，经过八周训练将团队语言达标线提升至 85%，通关速度因此提高三倍。 大学讲座模式失效与项目驱动学习 Biyani 强调传统高等教育体制已经脱节，大型阶梯教室讲座的到课率在很多大学已跌破 10%，而校方行政人员通常将 90% 的精力消耗在教工政治和校友官僚事务上，未能以本科生为中心。大学打包提供的常规讲座占用了学生近 50% 的时间，却恰恰是学生认为最无价值的部分，真正的价值反而来自于同侪合作、人脉网络与实践探索。 针对 18 至 22 岁群体的教育，Liemandt 与 Biyani 主张通过解决重大真实问题来倒逼理论学习。在 Alpha 开展的暑期实习项目中，来自 MIT、Stanford 和 UT Austin 的 70 多名顶尖学生中，仅有一人认为所在大学能为毕业后的职场做好准备，普遍担忧初级脑力岗位将被 AI 取代。该实习生群体在没有指定教材的情况下，自发投入每周 80 小时的高强度工作，研发可在廉价硬件上本地运行的开源教育小语言模型（SLM），通过实际构建软件主动攻读认知学习科学论文。 对标1910年拖拉机变革与家长心理 (25:00) Liemandt 将当前生成式 AI 对白领岗位的冲击，与 1910 年左右 Case 拖拉机进入美国农场引发的变革相提并论。当时拖拉机迅速取代了约 30% 的农业劳动力，迫使仅有八年级受教育水平的乡村社区主动投票增税，创立此前从未存在过的现代高中体制。如今生成式 AI 正在淘汰初级知识工作，家庭同样需要跨越代际认知，接纳与自身成长轨迹完全不同的新型教育模式。 在市场推广方面，Liemandt 观察到处于“五码线”的高中生家长往往因升学惯性倾向于坚守传统名校升学路径，而幼儿园及小学阶段的家长具有 12 年的前瞻视野，更愿意拥抱颠覆性模式。Alpha 在扩张至 50 个校区时采用有针对性的筛选策略，初期纽约校区仅招收 10 至 12 名学生，但通过明确的产品定位吸引高信念家庭并排除疑虑者，在办学成果显现后即迅速满额；HAA 亦通过首年免学费和一年期项目设计降低家庭的尝试风险。 实战创业训练与打破精英光环 (50:00) 针对未来职场，Biyani 指出试图寻找“不受 AI 影响的安全专业”是一种纯粹的防守思维，学生应当以进攻姿态结合自身兴趣掌握 AI 工具。Alpha 从幼儿园起利用代币系统开展基础金融教育，并在高中设立 Founders School，为学生设定从 100 美元逐级累加至 100 万美元利润的商业阶段目标，甚至附带未达成则全额退还学费的保障承诺。数名九年级学生在入学数月内已开始快速突破前几个阶段。 此外，将行业领袖请入教学场景能够有效打破对“伟大”的神秘化认知。Liemandt 举例称，一名 14 岁学生曾直接致电英伟达 CEO 黄仁勋并获得 90 秒通话机会，黄仁勋在通话中直言批评其问题准备不充分，给其通话准备打了“不及格”，该反馈成为全校汲取教训的经典案例。引用经济学家 Tyler Cowen 的观点，Liemandt 与 Biyani 强调教育的核心职责是推高学生对自我的野心，通过与顶尖同侪及业界人物的真实碰撞，让年轻人意识到自身完全有能力解决真实世界中的硬核难题。 本期对话展现了由技术专家主导的教育重塑尝试，强调自适应软件大幅压缩通识学习时间，为创业与高强度项目释放空间；但该模式能否在缺乏高度自律生源或离开高密度初创孵化支持的更广泛普通公立教育体系中顺利复制，仍是有待长期检验的现实课题。

## Background 本期节目由 Erik Torenberg、Gagan Biyani 与 Joe Liemandt 于 2026 年 10 月 27 日在播客平台发布。节目主要探讨在 AI 大幅提升知识吸收效率的背景下，学校应如何颠覆传统模式，将重心从单纯应试转向培养学生的主动性、团队协作、创业精神与应对艰难挑战的现实生活技能。 ## TL;DR Alpha School 创始人 Joe Liemandt 与 Horowitz and Andreessen Academy (HAA) 联合创始人 Gagan Biyani 深入探讨了 AI 时代从 K-12 到高等教育的重塑路径。在 Alpha 模式下，学生每天仅需 2 小时自适应学习即可在学术上名列前茅，其余时间则投入硬核团队协作、商业项目与密室逃脱等现实挑战中。嘉宾们指出传统大学的大课讲座已然崩塌，教育应顺应学生的内在动机，通过真刀真枪做项目、对接顶级导师以及建立宏大野心，培养具备进攻心态与动手能力的 AI 原生代构建者。 ## Atmosphere & style 对谈节奏紧凑而充满创业者的实干锐气，充溢着颠覆百年传统教育沉疴的激进与笃定。三位嘉宾在科技创业与教育创新上认知高度同频，不仅有尖锐剖析传统名校“虚伪闹剧”的辛辣针砭，也有诸如 14 岁少年冷电话连线黄仁勋等生动硬核的实战案例。整场交流既展现出理性乐观的未来图景，又传递出一种打破认知上限、赋能年轻一代去亲手建造世界的澎湃感染力。 ## Bulletin - `00:00` Alpha School 采用 AI 学习引擎，将学生每天的核心学术时间压缩至 2 小时，考试成绩仍可达到传统 6 小时教学成效的 2 倍并进入前 1% 梯队，全天其余时间全额用于培养团队协作、创业和坚毅等五大核心生活技能。 - `15:00` 针对全美顶尖名校（如 MIT、斯坦福）学生的调研显示，绝大多数人认为大学理论课程无法应对 AI 时代入门级白领岗位的消失危机，传统百人基础大课正逐渐沦为到课率暴跌的“虚伪闹剧”。 - `33:00` 面向高等教育探索的 Horowitz and Andreessen Academy（HAA）推行首年免学费与低试错成本机制，主张以解决真实工程难题、高主动性与导师网络为核心，重塑青年学生的内在驱动力。 - `50:00` Alpha 面向高中阶段设立 Founders School，推行阶梯式商业技能训练，并作出若学生在校期间未创立赚取 100 万美元利润的企业则退还全额学费的激进承诺。 ## Key takeaways - `00:00` AI 与认知科学彻底打破了传统 K-12 讲台单向灌输的范式，个性化学习引擎让知识吸收提速 10 倍，倒逼学校重构全天的教学目标。 - `05:00` Alpha 提出“让孩子爱上学胜过爱度假”的愿景，其核心不是娱乐化教学，而是满足孩子渴望与同伴并肩攻克高难度硬核任务的天性。 - `10:00` 自适应学习引擎的核心在于“为孩子设计胜利”，通过将做题正确率动态锚定在 80% 至 85% 的区间，避免低于 66% 导致的挫败放弃或 100% 导致的无效复读。 - `13:30` 传统高等教育的治理危机在于校方将 90% 的精力消耗在教职员与行政等成年人身上，导致教学设计脱离真实世界与学生核心诉求。 - `20:00` 大学本质上是一个“打包产品”，讽刺之处在于官方耗时最多的大课讲座正在崩塌，而学生真正获益的课外网络、同伴社团与动手实践却完全由生态自驱产生。 - `22:30` 家长群体心态出现代际分水岭，高学历名校家长反而愈发怀疑常春藤路线，新教育机构应当遵循创新采用曲线，优先服务前沿先锋家庭。 - `25:00` 当前教育变革与 1910 年代农业拖拉机革命如出一辙，家长需要跨越认知局限，资助并支持自己从未亲身体验过的项目制教育体系。 - `30:00` 新形态教育机构必须推行“磁石营销”，通过极端清晰的产品定位吸引深度认同的早期采纳者，坚决劝退排斥 AI 与屏幕技术的落后者。 - `45:00` 面对 AI 浪潮，试图通过选专业来建立“防御壁垒”是徒劳的，教育的重点是培养主动进攻（Offense）心态，在热爱的领域成为 AI 原生构筑者。 - `47:30` 创业绝非偶发灵感，而是一套可被系统传授与刻意练习的技能栈，应当从幼儿园阶段通过基础商业回路与实践进行系统化下沉训练。 - `51:40` 教育体系最欠缺的关键一环是人脉的去魅化，通过与黄仁勋等顶级领袖面对面获得严苛反馈，能彻底打破年轻人的盲目神话滤镜。 - `53:35` 新型学校与导师机制的终极价值在于“抬高学生对自身潜力的野心上限”，打破百年来教育僵化的边界，让新一代年轻人具备塑造未来的底气。 ## Detailed walkthrough ### `00:00` 重新设计 AI 时代的学校模式 随着认知科学、学习科学的发展以及大语言模型（LLM）的出现，传统的教育范式正在被彻底打破。过去上百年来，K-12 教育的教学设计与交付模式几乎毫无变化：一位教师站在讲台上，向全班几十名学生单向灌输知识。然而，如今借助由 AI 与认知科学驱动的“学习引擎”，孩子们的学习速度可以比传统的讲台授课快上 10 倍。这立刻带来了一个颠覆性的问题：既然学生能在极短时间内掌握传统学术课程，那么剩下的在校时间该如何安排？ Alpha School 创始人 Joe Liemandt 联合 Horowitz and Andreessen Academy（HAA）联合创始人 Gagan Biyani，与主持人 Erik Torenberg 一同探讨了这场教育革命。在 Alpha 运转的激进模式下，学生每天仅需投入大约 2 个小时进行核心学术学习，即可在标准化考试中名列前茅；而全天的其余时间，则被用于通过真实的团队项目去培养那些传统课堂极难教授的“现实生活技能”（Life Skills），如团队协作、创业精神、公开表达、社交关系以及应对艰难挑战的毅力。对于更高层级的大学阶段（如 HAA 针对的大学生群体），这种模式同样适用——教育不再是为了通过考试，而是让学生与处于前沿的顶尖人才并肩协作，通过解决真实的现实问题来驱动学习。 在面临“是否要放弃传统名校如常春藤盟校，冒险进入全新机构”的家长疑虑时，这种新模式给出了坚定的回答：面对 AI 时代，教育的重心不应再去费尽心机预测哪些职业“不会被 AI 取代”，而是要赋予年轻一代强大的主体性（agency）、合作关系以及开拓工具，让他们满怀信心地去亲手创造未来。 - **三项对学生的承诺**：Alpha 的首要承诺是“让孩子们热爱学校”。最新问卷调查显示，超过 90% 的学生表示热爱上学，50% 的学生明确表示“比起去度假，更愿意来学校上学”，其中一个校区这一比例甚至高达 65%。 - **核心学术表现**：每天仅需 2 小时学术学习，学习成效却能达到传统学校（上课 6 小时外加课后作业）的 2 倍；随着知识复利累积，无论起点如何，学生最终都能进入学术前 1% 的顶尖梯队，在标准化测试中斩获亮眼成绩。 - **重新填补全天时间**：校长绝不能因为教学提速就在 2 小时后把学生送回家，其余大半天被重新构想为培养适应未来变化的五大生活技能： 1. 领导力与团队协作（Leadership and teamwork） 2. 创业精神与财商素养（Entrepreneurship and financial literacy） 3. 社交能力与关系建立（Socialization, relationship building） 4. 讲故事与公众演讲（Storytelling, public speaking） 5. 坚毅品质与刻苦耐劳（Grit, hard work） - **规模迅速扩张**：从奥斯汀起步，仅去年就新增了 12 个校区，目前校区总数已迅速扩张至 50 所，市场需求呈现爆发式增长。 --- ### `05:00` 从“不可信”到“规模化”：以产品思维和 AI 实现质量跃升 Gagan Biyani 回忆起六年前探访 Alpha 的经历，当时 Joe Liemandt 尚未全职投入该项目。作为深耕学习科学近二十年的业内人士，Gagan 迅速理解了其底层逻辑，但他强调 Joe 在过去几年完成的最惊人突破，是让这种看似不可思议的模式具备了极强的“可信度”（believability），使人们从怀疑“2 小时怎么可能学完全部课程”，转变为发出理所当然的疑问：“既然如此，我们未来为何还要用旧方式教学？” Joe Liemandt 解释称，自己四年前正式接任校长职位，而他的背景本质上是科技产品与创业。传统教育最大的死穴在于极难规模化——一旦学校扩大规模，教学质量往往大幅下滑。过去三年，他的工作核心就是用“产品化包装”（Product Packaging）将这种教学法转化为易于理解、标准一致且具备高度扩展性的产品。而引入 AI 的最大红利正是让学校在扩张的同时提高品质，形成了“越做越大，品质越好”（we get better as we get bigger）的正向飞轮：无论是考试成绩、家长满意度、学生幸福感，还是实践工作坊的质感，都在伴随规模扩张而逐年提升。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 传统教育模式与 Alpha AI 驱动模式对比 accDescr: 对比传统课堂与 Alpha 模式在时间分配与教学核心上的巨大差异 subgraph TRAD["传统百年课堂模式"] T1["讲台单向授课 6-7 小时"] --> T2["耗时且低效的知识灌输"] T2 --> T3["应试考试与课后作业"] end subgraph ALPHA["Alpha 学校创新模式"] A1["AI 认知科学驱动学习引擎 (2小时)"] --> A2["高质学术成果与标化顶尖表现"] A1 --> A3["现实生活技能工作坊 (4-5小时)"] A3 --> A4["密室逃脱等硬核团队挑战"] end ``` 针对 Erik Torenberg 提到的“大部分人极度厌恶自己的 K-12 阶段”，Joe 剖析了传统教育科技（EdTech）长期失效的根源：绝大多数人只是把软件简单塞进死板的传统作息表里，注定全盘皆输。他认为驱动一切的关键在于办学者的核心意愿与对学生底层动机（Motivation）的唤醒。 > “Are you willing to redesign your school day so kids love it more than vacation?” —— Joe Liemandt Joe 强调，当人们听说“让孩子爱上学胜过爱度假”时，常误以为学校变成了可以整天打电子游戏的迪士尼乐园，但现实恰恰相反：“孩子们天生渴望迎接艰巨的挑战，并且渴望与朋友并肩攻克难关。”在家里也可以玩游戏，能让他们发自内心更想去学校的原因，正是因为在学校里他们能和同伴一起完成极具挑战性的硬核任务。 在培养团队协作（Teamwork）方面，传统学校的做法往往形同虚设。大多数课堂分组项目最终沦为“一个人扛下所有，其他人坐享其成”的反面教材，以至于学生不仅没学会合作，反而养成了反向模式（anti-pattern）。一个典型例证是沃顿商学院（Wharton）著名的攀登珠峰（Mount Everest）团队协作模拟挑战，竟然有高达 50% 的 MBA 精英学生以失败告终，究其原因在于他们的整个学生生涯从未接受过真正的团队训练。在 Alpha，三年级的学生被直接戴上微型麦克风，被集体推进密室逃脱（Escape Room）任务中： - **语音与 AI 行为分析**：在首次测试中，AI 分析学生对话转录文本发现，全场仅有不到 20% 的语言属于鼓舞人心、提供协助的团队导向话语，其余充斥着内讧争吵、推脱以及“听我的想法”等自我中心言论。 - **量化达标机制**：学校为此设立了为期 8 周的专项工作坊，学生反复在实践中纠偏复盘。要通过这门课程，学生的团队建设性语言与行为比例必须达到 85% 以上。 - **客观效能转化**：数据直观地证明给孩子们看——当团队协作行为达标时，他们破解密室逃脱的速度比之前整整快了 3 倍。 - **课程严谨度**：到了四、五年级，这套涵盖五大维度的“生活技能体系”，在执行标准与考核严谨度上完全不亚于物理等核心学术学科。 ### `10:00` 逃脱游戏挑战、个性化学习引擎与 80-85% 成功区间 在 Alpha School，测试不再是千篇一律的期末数学考试，而是必须通过类似密室逃脱的综合考验。例如四五年级的学生需要攻克沃顿商学院的 MBA 商业挑战（Wharton MBA challenge），而现实中连半数真正的 MBA 学生都未必能通过。当九十岁的小学生靠自己的能力通关时，他们会油然而生出强烈的自豪感与兴奋感，进而渴望迎接更多挑战。传统教育模式受限于让孩子整天死坐教室，根本没有空间提前开发这些高阶能力，但有了新工具后，教育者必须下沉并加速这类能力的培养。孩子之所以热爱这种学校，是因为他们能真切感受到自己学得更快、成长更迅速，并建立了深厚的同伴关系——这些绝不是放假度假能带给他们的体验。 谈及学生为何普遍厌学，根本原因在于传统学校常逼迫孩子面对无法承受的失败。在体育运动中，美国家庭常常让孩子晚一年入学，目的是让他们身体更强壮、在赛场上更容易赢球并获得赞扬，从而走上正向循环。但传统学术教育是“基于时间推进”的死板系统，学生一旦在某一环脱节，剩下的在校时光就成了无休止的折磨。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 个性化学习引擎与传统课堂对比 accDescr: 对比传统课堂按时间同步推进与个性化引擎保持动态难度区间的不同路径 subgraph Traditional["传统教学模式（按时间推进）"] T1["30人班级统一授课进度"] --> T2{"学生某知识点脱节"} T2 -->|"无法回退补课"| T3["后续学习变成长期折磨与脱节"] end subgraph AlphaEngine["Alpha 学习引擎（基于掌握度）"] A1["诊断当前掌握水平"] --> A2{"答题正确率监测"} A2 -->|"低于 66%（太难易放弃）"| A3["自动降级推送脚手架补漏课程"] A2 -->|"处于 80%-85%（心流区间）"| A4["稳步构建信心，高效掌握"] A2 -->|"达到 100%（太简单无提升）"| A5["跳过重复内容，加速跨级进阶"] end ``` Alpha 的底层学习引擎彻底打破了年级限制，哪怕八年级学生欠缺五年级知识点，系统也会为其精准推送五年级的补救课程，帮助其顺利过关后再行推进。这个引擎的核心逻辑在于“为孩子设计胜利（engineer wins）”，精准将做题正确率锁定在 80% 到 85% 之间： - **高于 85%（乃至 100%）**：属于过于简单，学生纯粹是在机械倒嚼旧知识，并未发生实质性认知升级。 - **低于 66%（即三分之二）**：如同游戏设计法则所揭示的，一旦失败率超过三分之二，参与者就会彻底失去兴趣并退出。 - **动态脚手架（Scaffolding）**：一旦发现学生吃力，引擎立刻插入辅助阶梯；一旦轻松掌握，则自动提升进度速度。 Joe Liemandt 尖锐地指出了传统课堂与自适应引擎的鸿沟：“So one of the things that a learning engine can do that a teacher in front of a classroom with 30 people can't do is make sure the kid gets an unending stream of learning lessons and questions that's 80 to 85 percent accurate.” --- ### `13:30` 从 K-12 到高等教育：打造以学生为中心的重塑模式 Gagan Biyani 表示，自初次参访 Alpha School 起，他就深受其教育理念启发，而这也是创办 Horowitz and Andreessen Academy（HAA）的核心论点：如果利用现代工具针对现代社会重新设计教育，完全可以实现两全其美。人们常认为上大学是为了积攒人脉或成为更好的人，新机制则能将人脉质量提升 10 倍，并系统性地把学生培养成具有高主动性（high agency）、勇于攻坚（do hard things）且追求正和博弈的个体。 不过，不同年龄段的认知模式有着本质分野：K-8（幼儿园至八年级）、高中与大学这三个阶段各不相同，不能生搬硬套同一套打法。更关键的阻碍在于大学治理架构的异化：全美绝大多数高校领导人之所以无法办出卓越的教育，是因为体制迫使他们将 90% 的时间和精力花在应付周遭的成年人（教职员、行政人员、捐赠人）身上，真正落在学生身上的关注微乎其微。相比之下，Alpha School 的所有思考和讨论则始终全神贯注地聚焦于孩子本身。 --- ### `15:00` 顶尖名校生的现实危机：从空头文凭到 80 小时真刀真枪造产品 作为 HAA 的投资人兼顾问，Joe Liemandt 直言，高等教育与 K-12 一样亟待彻底颠覆，而且他创办的 Alpha School 也迫切需要为毕业生找到承接去处。他不赞成那种“高中毕业后就不必再读大学”的论调，真正的问题在于现行大学太糟糕，根本没法让年轻人应对真实世界。 今年夏天，有 70 多名来自麻省理工学院（MIT）、斯坦福大学（Stanford）及德克萨斯大学（UT）的学生来到 Alpha 实习。当被问及“你们就读的名校是否让你们为毕业后的世界做好了准备”时，全场数十名顶尖高材生中仅有一人举手。这群经历了 12 年应试苦读挤进顶尖学府的年轻人，内心充满了恐惧：他们发现随着 AI 发展，过去那些毕业前一两年的入门级白领岗位正迅速蒸发，大学教授的理论课程完全无法抵抗即将到来的淘汰风险。 在实习期间，这些大学生被赋予了极具野心的使命：共同打造一个专为教育设计的小语言模型（Educational LLM / SLM），使其能够在端侧设备上离线免费运行，以服务不同主权国家的教育需求。面对这种具备宏大现实意义的硬核项目，这群年轻人自发每周工作 80 个小时： - **主动式学术钻研**：实习过程中没有任何指定的死板教材，他们完全出于项目需要，自发深入研读最新的学习科学与机器学习前沿论文。 - **结合工程架构**：他们深入研究 Alpha 内部被称为“脑力提升（brain lift）”的数据结构，并将经典的学术调研成果快速落地为真实的软件构建。 - **学生的心声反馈**：这群大学生感慨，这才是大学本该有的样子——不再是坐在阶梯教室听课，而是所有人为了一个能真正改变世界的超难工程协同攻坚并发表研究成果。 Joe Liemandt 总结大学阶段的不可替代性在于必须让学生成为真正的创造者：“Right. And that's when I think about what you guys are doing of reinventing it and letting kids really build. Right. It's not just about the classes. It's about getting ready for the real world and all those skills you need.” Gagan Biyani 呼应了这一观点，强调对于 18 岁野心勃勃的青年而言，学习本质上 90% 取决于动机。此时年轻人的真正驱动力不再是虚无的成绩单，而是创造真正有人使用的产品、创造营收以及踏入社会的核心竞争力。大学教育理应彻底顺应这一动机，让学生在泥泞的实践、试错与挫折应对中完成真正的认知跃升。 ### `20:00` 大学“大课”模式的崩溃与校园体验的真正价值 谈及现代大学教育的困境，Gagan Biyani 指出传统授课模式已彻底失效。在二十年前他读大学时，课堂出勤率大约还有 50%，当时大概只有 20% 的学生像他一样无法接受那种授课形式；然而如今他再去斯坦福大学等名校时，发现出勤率已经跌破 10%，几乎没有学生真正喜欢这种大课讲座的形态。他认为，必须重构教育的形式，才能激发学生自驱的学习动机，这也是他们创办 Andreessen Horowitz Academy 的核心初衷。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: 现代大学“打包产品”的价值割裂 accDescr: 展示大学官方提供的传统大课讲座与学生真正获益的课外网络、社团及实践之间的对比 subgraph Formal["官方正式提供（耗费50%时间，逐渐被弃）"] A["百人基础大课 (100-series Lecture)"] B["单向被动听讲 / 刷 TikTok 旷课"] end subgraph StudentDriven["学生自驱与生态价值（真正留存的核心）"] C["小班研讨课 (Small Seminars)"] D["学生社团、项目与同行人脉"] E["行业大咖交流 (Jobs / Bill Joy / McNealy)"] F["与同伴动手做项目、创立公司"] end Formal -.->|"体验崩塌 / 被视为无意义闹剧"| G["学生需求转移"] G --> StudentDriven ``` Joe Liemandt 紧接着分享了一个生动的真实案例：Alpha 创立初期的一批毕业生在进入大学后的第一个圣诞假期聚在一起。尽管这群孩子在大学里全拿 4.0 的满分 GPA（Straight As），但他们却一致抱怨那些 100 系列的百人大型讲座课完全是浪费时间；其中有五位学生甚至给大学校报撰写社论，痛斥这些课堂就是一场“虚伪的闹剧”（charade）——台上教授自顾自讲，台下零星的学生低头刷 TikTok，大部分人干脆翘课。与之形成鲜明对比的是，他们非常喜欢小型研讨课、社团活动以及围绕校园构建的各种实践圈子。 Joe Liemandt 结合自己当年从斯坦福退学的亲身经历强调，大学本质上是一个“打包产品”（bundle of products）。荒谬之处在于： - **大学官方唯一正式提供的部分**——也就是占据学生 50% 时间的传统学术大课，恰恰是学生最想淘汰的东西； - **学生真正热爱的部分**——包括结识优秀的同伴、与造访校园的科技先驱（如 Steve Jobs 来做演讲，或是与 Bill Joy、Scott McNealy 共进午餐交流行业前沿）建立连接，以及和朋友们一起动手做真实项目并最终孵化出自己的创业公司，全都是由学生自驱和校园生态衍生出来的，而非来自讲台上的灌输。 > “You need to reinvent the format in order to create motivation so they actually learn things.” —— Gagan Biyani --- ### `22:30` 家长心态的分水岭：常春藤名校光环的褪色 随后对话转向了对教育变革至关重要的群体——家长。Joe Liemandt 表示，他如今与数万名 K-12 阶段的家长进行过深入交流，发现家长群体的心态正在发生惊人的转变。过去几乎所有人都执着于从幼儿园直通常春藤盟校的既定通道；但现在，哪怕是自身毕业于哈佛或斯坦福的高学历父母，也开始产生严重的分化。许多名校校友家长非常明确地表示，他们并不希望自己的孩子再走当年的老路，因为他们深知那个体系已经无法让下一代应对未来的真实世界。 Joe Liemandt 观察到不同年龄段家长之间存在着一种“距离底线（Goal-line）”的心态差异： - **高中阶段的家长**：如同打美式橄榄球推进到了“5码线”（five yard line），心理上往往选择妥协，“既然已经在这条路上走了这么久，干脆保底先把孩子送进大学再说”，不敢轻易冒险推翻重来。 - **幼儿园及小学低龄段家长**：视野看的是未来 12 到 15 年，他们清醒地意识到世界的底层逻辑发生了巨变，继续因循守旧绝不可能让孩子做好准备。他们正在主动寻找全新的教育路径。 因此，Joe Liemandt 对 Gagan Biyani 表示，新式学院在学生端一定会获得巨大的自发需求，因为年轻人能一眼看出新模式的优越性；但真正的挑战在于如何向家长进行“二次销售”（separate sales job），说服习惯了旧体制的父母跨出传统舒适区。 > “There's still some families who are like, you know, I'm a kindergarten parent and I want to see the direct path right into the Ivy League. But an equal number, maybe even more of parents who went to Stanford or Harvard who are like, no, I know I don't want my kid on that path.” —— Joe Liemandt --- ### `25:00` 1910年拖拉机革命的历史镜鉴与跨越教育采用曲线 为了帮助理解当前的教育变革，Joe Liemandt 提出了一个极具启发性的历史类比：1910 年代美国农业社会的工业化转型。 | 时代维度 | 1910 年代农业转型 | 2020 年代 AI 时代教育转型 | |:--- |:--- |:--- | | **社会技能现状** | 90% 美国人仅有 8 年级文化水平；超 30% 人口为农场劳动力 | 大学生依托传统百人讲座、死记硬背与应试升学路径 | | **生产力颠覆冲击** | Case 拖拉机开进农场，单机抵得上 50 名农工劳力 | AI 工具（如 Anthropic 广告所示）单人替代 50 名基础程序员的产能 | | **就业路径断裂** | 农场基础体力劳动岗位永久性消失，世代相传的营生终结 | 斯坦福、MIT 等顶尖名校毕业生在暑期惊呼毕业即面临失业 | | **突破性的应对** | 农夫主动投票支持增税，资助自己从未体验过的高中教育体系 | 家长需要跨越认知局限，拥抱从没经历过的项目制与自主式学习模型 | Joe Liemandt 指出，1910 年代的美国农民深知自身只有初中水平，也没有亲眼见过高中课程，但他们敏锐地察觉到拖拉机普及后时代变了，于是毅然投票自愿加税去建立全新的高中体系（工业化教育体系）。正是那套体制支撑了美国过去 100 年的繁荣。如今，以 AI 为代表的技术变革再次终结了传统的知识灌输模式，现代家长同样需要具备当年农民的远见，敢于支持一种自己未曾体验过的教育形态。 对于 Erik Torenberg 提出的“面对能把孩子送进常春藤名校的家长，新学院该如何说服他们承担风险”这一问题，Joe Liemandt 结合 Alpha 过去四年的真实经验给出了回答： 1. **遵循创新采用曲线（Adoption Curve）**：办新型学校并不需要一开始就争取所有家长的认同，早期只需要抓住那些深刻意识到旧体制缺陷的先锋家庭。 2. **用真实结果化解疑虑**：当年他的两个女儿在初中选择进入 Alpha 时，周围所有人都断言她们绝对不可能考上好大学，必须回归传统学校。然而四年过去，当年选择所谓“传统安全路径”的家庭很多陷入悔恨，反而是 Alpha 的第一批毕业生全方位出类拔萃，事实证明传统路径才是真正的高风险选择。 3. **创始人的自身转变也是渐进的**：Joe 坦承自己最初也不是信徒。虽然他当年大学辍学并在车库里创业，但当 Mackenzie Price 和 Brian 在 12 年前创办 Alpha 时，他看着那个设在车库里的简陋学校，甚至吐槽“学校怎么能在车库里？这太山寨、太诡异了”，继续把女儿送去传统天主教学校。直到观望了整整两年后，他才真正跨越了心理门槛将孩子转入，而这一决定最终被证明无比正确。他相信新学院只要熬过没有数据支撑的第一年，让外界看到首届学生的惊人蜕变，口碑与飞轮效应就会迅速确立。 > “And what America did back then is they voted to actually raise their taxes. And this is the key part: fund an education that they'd never experienced.” —— Joe Liemandt ### `30:00` 早期采纳者的正向筛选与“磁石营销” Joe Liemandt 回忆起创办 Alpha School 的经历：虽然自己的孩子至今还会抱怨他动作太慢、应该早两年就启动，但寻找首批认同理念的家庭始终是最关键的一步。如今 Alpha 已经在全美开设了 50 个校区，说明会能吸引成千上万的家长；然而在一年前筹建最初 12 个校区时，连招募 25 名学生都异常艰难。以纽约校区为例，开办之初仅有 10 到 12 名学生，而如今校区早已满员，候选池总人数甚至达到 15 万人。大众往往需要亲眼看到前人的成功才敢跟进，一旦第一批人的成果显现，需求便会呈爆发式增长。 ```mermaid flowchart TD accTitle: Alpha School 招生与家庭筛选漏斗 accDescr: 展示从说明会初期拓展、磁石营销双向筛选，到早期采纳者形成正向社区并引爆后续规模化需求的递进过程。 subgraph Phase1["初期拓展与筛选"] A["举办宣讲会 / 拓展新校区"] --> B["磁石营销筛选"] B -->|"排斥 (抗拒 AI / 屏幕时间)"| C["不契合家庭 (自动流失)"] B -->|"吸引 (信念坚定 / 敢冒风险)"| D["早期采纳家庭 (首批 10-25 人)"] end subgraph Phase2["验证与规模化"] D --> E["小规模验证成功"] E --> F["需求爆发式增长<br/>(如纽约校区满员 / 15 万关注池)"] end ``` Gagan Biyani 指出，在早期就敢于报名的家庭具有极强的勇气和信念，这与彼得·蒂尔的“蒂尔奖学金”（Thiel Fellowship）早期极为相似——虽然申请基数小，但形成了一种积极的“正向自我选择”（Positive self-selection），让最聪明的孩子和最有胆识的家长聚在了一起。Joe Liemandt 对此十分认同，并给出建议：初创阶段必须招募双方都全情投入（All-in）的家庭，因为初创学校难免会遇到波折和纰漏，抱有怀疑态度的晚期采纳者（Late adopters）根本承受不住这种不确定性。他倡导“磁石营销”（Magnet marketing）原则：明确自身的产品定义，吸引对的人，同时坚决劝退那些抗拒 AI 或排斥屏幕时间的家长。正如 Joe Liemandt 明确指出： > “You want to attract the right people and repel the wrong people who want to be laggards.” - **校区扩张规模**：Alpha 已开设 50 个校区，纽约校区从最初仅 10-12 人发展到满员，全美相关关注和申请总人数达到约 15 万人。 - **产品定义的重要性**：绝大多数传统学校缺乏清晰的产品定位；而新形态教育机构必须清晰界定“我们是什么、我们不是什么”，通过明确的边界筑牢早期学生和家长的社区纽带。 --- ### `33:00` 一年探索期：低试错成本与自主权的觉醒 针对 Gagan Biyani 筹办的 Horowitz and Andreessen Academy（HAA），Gagan 总结了两条办学准则：第一，严格把控入学者门槛，而非一味追求班级人数；第二，这种教育项目并不面向大众，只需要那些真正极度渴望它的人。此外，HAA 的学制为一年且首年免学费。与初中（例如缺课八年级可能难以挽回）不同，大学阶段休学一年进行探索的沉没成本极低，学生随时可以重返原有大学或重新申请。 Joe Liemandt 认为一年免学费且支持延期入学的设定是面向家长时巨大的竞争优势，“尝试它没有任何下行风险”（There's no downside to trying it）。他向家长们建言：如果孩子真心渴望参与这种探索，就应当放手让他们去闯；哪怕最终没有取得世俗意义的成功，这也将是孩子人生中最深刻的一段学习经历，能让他们为未来的道路做好准备，强行阻拦反而具有更大的风险。 Gagan Biyani 进而剖析了自己年少时的叛逆根源：他们这批人在读书期间往往都不喜欢学校，症结在于被迫去做自己完全不认同的事情。当十三四岁自主意识（Agency）开始觉醒时，他看穿了传统体制的“皇帝的新衣”，意识到台上的老师甚至不懂得如何科学地教数学，却依然逼迫学生参加机械的考试。因此，无论是 Alpha 还是新学院，其核心教学哲学都是围绕学生进行逆向设计，从根本上赢得学生的内在认同（Buy-in），消解被动服从带来的叛逆，激发自主成长的动力。 --- ### `35:00` 从“不务正业”到周拼100小时：做热爱且艰难的事 谈及对传统教育的抗拒，Joe Liemandt 分享了一段颇具戏剧性的个人往事：他在 K-12 阶段始终是个让学校头疼的“刺头”，频繁逃课，仅凭应付考试的最低努力考入斯坦福大学（Stanford University），随后便毅然退学创业。当时他的父亲怒不可遏，甚至在《福布斯》（Forbes）等媒体上公开骂道“我儿子是个蠢材”（My son's a moron），深怕他沦为一个无所事事的懒汉。然而仅仅两年后，父亲目睹了他每周疯狂工作 100 小时、困了就直接睡在办公桌底下的创业状态，彻底转变了观念，坦承当年退学是他做过的最正确的决定。父亲感慨道，一旦孩子找到了自己真正热爱的事业，就会爆发出全神贯注的投入度。 Joe Liemandt 强调，这正是 Alpha 所追求的愿景——“打造一所让孩子觉得比放假还喜欢的学校”（Building a school they love more than vacation）。许多家长惊叹孩子入读一个月就判若两人，根本原因在于学校引导他们去挑战自己热爱的硬核难题。普通学校里的优等生往往是在轻松混日子（Coast through normal school），而优秀的创新学校则会吸引那些主动渴望挑战艰难任务的学生。正如 Joe Liemandt 总结的那样： > “And having a school where your kid wants to go to it because they're going to be doing hard things. Right. Is, you know, is as as is it's a great thing.” - **世界学校（World School）非洲实践**：Alpha 的高中项目设立了“世界学校”，学生前往非洲进行为期一年的公益与服务性实践；入选前必须签署一份写着“我明白这将是我人生中最艰难一年”的协议，但学生们皆踊跃签署并充满期待。 - **发展中国家单人旅行**：Gagan Biyani 透露 HAA 为学生设置了差旅津贴（Stipend），虽然使用方式完全由学生自主决定，但他个人极力鼓励学生独自前往人均 GDP 低于 2 万美元的国家（如印度或斯里兰卡），以此磨练生存能力、拓宽认知视野，并为未来的商业洞察打下基础。 - **应试直 A 与真实世界能力的断层**：许多在传统结构下拿满分 GPA 的“乖学生”，一旦脱离了外在考核框架，便完全失去了内在驱动力与探索方向，进入真实职场后极不适应；真正的全人教育（Holistic person）必须超越卷面成绩，聚焦于应对现实世界的底层生存与通用技能。 ### `40:00` AI 时代的人才特质与学生构建者（Builder）的崛起 对于传统大学课程的重构，雇主与教育者的诉求正高度趋同。传统的大学往往将实践能力、领导力等软技能放在可选的课外社团中，然而雇主普遍抱怨毕业生缺乏真正胜任工作的实际能力。要掌握这些技能，唯一的途径就是在复杂的现实项目中摸爬滚打：与大量形形色色的人协作、动手搭建复杂系统、承受被拒绝的痛苦，并在缺乏外部结构时学会自我组织。 随着 AI 将传统智力与知识测试全面商品化，人类最宝贵的核心特质被重新定义为领导力、团队协作、主动性（Agency）、主人翁精神（Ownership）以及接收反馈的能力。这些特质无法通过坐在教室里听讲获得，必须来自真实项目的锤炼。 ```mermaid flowchart LR accTitle: AI时代人才能力转变路径 accDescr: 展现知识获取提速与核心竞争力从传统死记硬背转向以项目为核心的构建能力的演变过程。 subgraph Core["认知与技能重构"] direction TB A["传统死记硬背"] -->|"AI 提速 10 倍"| B["快速吸收领域知识<br/>(1年掌握硕士级知识)"] B --> C["以项目为核心的实践"] end subgraph Output["核心竞争特质"] direction TB C --> D["自主性与主人翁精神"] C --> E["团队协作与抗挫力"] C --> F["动手构建复杂系统"] end ``` 当被问及如果今天 18 岁该如何根据 AI 趋势规划教育时，Joe Liemandt 指出，AI 让学生吸收知识的速度提升了 10 倍，学生完全可以在一年内掌握相当于硕士学位的领域专长。更重要的是，AI 赋予了年轻人前所未有的“构建者超级力量”（Superpowers to build）： - Alpha High 的高中生们完全不持有“末日论”悲观情绪；正如 Joe Liemandt 描述的那样：“‘你们这帮成年人完蛋了，我们要来掀桌子了，因为我们拥有超级力量。’（‘You adults are cooked. Like we're coming for you and we have superpowers.’）” - 这些高中生已经在重写学校早期的底层软件架构，并深入钻研学习科学（Learning Science）。 - Joe Liemandt 大胆预测，两年之内大部分教育学习软件都将由学生自己编写，因为学生更懂同龄人的兴趣点，能把枯燥的学科内容变成极致引人入胜的体验。例如校内一位名叫 Austin 的学生开发了一套 AP 历史课程软件，融入了类似 GeoGuessr 的地理竞猜机制、S 级排行体系以及嘴碎毒舌的 AI（snarky AI），最终带领所有选修该课程的学生在 AP 考试中斩获了满分 5 分。 ### `45:00` 主动进攻思维：选择热爱，做“AI 原生代”构筑者 针对未来究竟该学什么专业才不会被 AI 淘汰的焦虑，Gagan Biyani 认为这种提问方式本身就陷入了防守姿态的误区。在未来的世界里，试图通过选专业来建立“防御壁垒”是徒劳的；真正的关键在于“什么是你真正感兴趣的领域”，并在这个领域里成长为 AI 原生代（AI-native）： - 无论是编程还是数学，传统的黑板粉笔流派可能面临巨大的冲击，但那些热爱数学并深度融合 AI 的新生代数学家，将完成前人无法想象的突破。 - Horowitz and Andreessen Academy (HAA) 在筛选学生时最看重的就是主动进攻心态（Offense mindset），极力规避那些出于防御心态只想追求所谓“避险专业”的申请者。 - Gagan Biyani 以自身深耕教育行业的经历说明：过去 15 年里教育并非最赚钱的创业赛道，但他依然能在自己热爱的领域里打磨出顶尖的能力水平，过上充实的生活。只要在一个垂直领域做到前 1%，就绝不会被淘汰。 Joe Liemandt 对此深表赞同，强调培养下一代绝不能让他们被动接受“世界会变成怎样”，而要让他们意识到自己就是世界的塑造者。Alpha School 让所有孩子阅读《理性乐观派》（*The Rational Optimist*），引导他们成为自信、乐观且擅长驾驭 AI 工具的构建者，充满底气地去创造未来，而不是在消极悲观中随波逐流。 ### `47:30` 创业技能下沉：从幼儿园到高中创办者学校（Founders School） 在具体的落地实践中，Joe Liemandt 介绍了他们为高中生量身打造的“创办者学校”（Founders School）。该校的核心理念是把创业精神和财商素养作为人生的基础核心技能栈（Life skill stack）进行系统化训练： - **AI 时代的商业组织演变**：由于 AI 带来的极致人效，未来的《财富》500 强大型企业规模将大幅缩减，但这将催生前所未有的创业大爆发，创业将成为更多年轻人的核心路径。 - **创业是一门可被教授的技能**：创业绝不是突然被雷电劈中般的灵光一现，而是一整套可以通过系统刻意练习掌握的技能体系。 - **从小建立商业与财务认知**：Alpha 的财商培养从幼儿园就已启动。学校设计了名为“Alphas”的校内货币，从幼儿园起就教导孩子们如何挣钱、储蓄、消费、投资和捐赠（earn, save, spend, invest, donate），建立基础的商业回路认知。 - **Founders School 的定位**：作为顶层的专项高中，Founders School 专为那些渴望把整个高中时光用于创办和运营真实业务的学生而设立，让他们在青春期就真刀真枪地在市场中探索与验证商业构想。 ### `50:00` 百万美金利润承诺与阶梯式商业技能训练 Joe Liemandt 提出了一个极具冲击力的办学承诺：如果学生在高中就读期间无法创立一家赚取 100 万美元利润的企业，学校将全额退还学费。Joe Liemandt 强调，这并非空头支票或营销噱头，因为在过去四年中，Alpha High 的学生已经积累了大量成功创业的实际数据支持。他们坚信创业和商业创造力绝非虚无缥缈的天赋，而是一套可以被反复、可靠传授的具体技能。 ```mermaid flowchart LR accTitle: 阶梯式商业里程碑训练法 accDescr: Alpha High 针对高中生设定的阶梯式商业利润达标路线图 subgraph Milestones["阶梯式利润目标"] M1["$100"] --> M2["$1,000"] M2 --> M3["$10,000"] M3 --> M4["$100,000"] M4 --> M5["$1,000,000"] end ``` 该项目于 8 月正式启动后，设计了一套循序渐进的通关式里程碑：学生必须先赚到 100 美元，并在过程中掌握相应的基础商业技能；随后目标依次提升至 1,000 美元、10,000 美元、100,000 美元，直至 100 万美元。令人惊讶的是，项目仅推进了几个月，这帮高一新生就开始在路线上“极速通关”（speed running）。Joe Liemandt 幽默地感叹道：“Okay, they're going to earn a million dollars in the first year. Like I'm out of curriculum and they're freshmen.”面对课程体系可能被提早刷爆的局面，这帮学生反而表现得极其从容，认为既然达标了，那就接着去创办一家规模更大的公司。 - 承诺条件：在高中毕业前实现 100 万美元净利润，否则退还全部学费 - 技能进阶路线：100 美元 → 1,000 美元 → 10,000 美元 → 100,000 美元 → 1,000,000 美元 - 学生现状：入学仅数月的高一新生已经展现出在首年达成百万目标的势头 ### `51:40` 人脉去魅化与黄仁勋的 90 秒冷电话电话辅导 除了商业基本功，Joe Liemandt 认为教育体系中最欠缺但至关重要的一环是人际关系网络与社交连接能力的建立。在传统名校（如斯坦福大学），其核心魅力在于能够让年轻人近距离接触各行各业的泰斗人物。当年轻人真正见到这些传奇人物时，就会意识到对方也是活生生的普通人，从而打破神话滤镜，产生“我也能做到”的自信——尤其是在年轻、莽撞且极其自命不凡的阶段，这种接触能释放巨大的潜能。 为了让高中生尽早融入现实商业世界，Alpha 鼓励学生主动向业界巨头出击。Joe Liemandt 分享了一个生动的真实故事：一名 14 岁的高中生通过冷电话（Cold Call）直接打给了英伟达（NVIDIA）CEO 黄仁勋（Jensen Huang）。令人意想不到的是，黄仁勋亲自回拨了电话。当意识到电话那头是个孩子后，黄仁勋耐心地给了他 90 秒的 Pitch 陈述时间。 在听完陈述后，黄仁勋给出了极其尖锐但价值千金的真实反馈。他直截了当地告诉这个孩子：你问的所有背景调查与资格性问题，完全可以通过自己做功课或向我公司里的其他员工了解，你却把宝贵的一发子弹浪费在我身上；如果做足准备，这次沟通的成效会好得多。虽然给这名学生的积极进取精神打了满分，但通话准备工作只能给不及格（F）。这通电话随后在学校和社交网络上引发了巨大轰动，成为那名学生人生中最宝贵的一课。事实证明，真正成功的成年人非常乐意为下一代投入时间和精力，而这种人脉搭建与现实碰撞是传统大学根本无法提供的。 ### `53:35` 抬高野心上限：导师在教育中的真正使命 Gagan Biyani 高度称赞了 Erik Torenberg 在搭建顶级人脉网络方面的专业能力，正是这种网络让 Andreessen & Horowitz 学院（HAA）以及 Founders School 的学生得以无缝对接各领域的顶级导师。Gagan Biyani 强调，将人脉与导师机制置于教育的核心，是新型学校不可替代的壁垒。 Gagan Biyani 提到了前几周做客节目的 Max Levchin。Max Levchin 曾回忆，他之所以敢于树立极其宏大的野心，正是因为早年与埃隆·马斯克（Elon Musk）、里德·霍夫曼（Reid Hoffman）以及大卫·萨克斯（David Sacks）并肩作战。在共同经历无数跌宕起伏的过程中，他看清了这些传奇领袖也同样具备常人的喜怒哀乐与脆弱，从而树立了强大的自信。HAA 同样希望通过邀请黄仁勋、萨姆·奥特曼（Sam Altman）、萨提亚·纳德拉（Satya Nadella）等业界领袖与年轻人分享一线的实战“战争故事”与波折，来彻底打开他们的眼界。 Joe Liemandt 对此深表赞同，并引用了经济学家泰勒·考恩（Tyler Cowen）的著名论断： > “Right. We try to live that at Alpha. Absolutely. And I believe that's very much when you sit here is that it's intentionally in your guys design of the people you're getting, the culture you're building, that you're going to be raising their ambition for what they can do in life.” 通过精心筛选的导师、独特的文化建设以及对极致成果的追求，教育的终极意义在于重构学生对自身潜力与人生高度的认知。 ### `55:00` 颠覆百年停滞：重新构想教育的边界与潜力 在对谈的尾声，Erik Torenberg 总结道，尽管 K-12 基础教育与高等教育存在诸多结构性差异，但两者面临着一个共同的历史现实：自 1910 年以来的过去一百多年里，整个教育范式几乎没有出现过颠覆性的新进入者或模式创新。无论是在大学阶段还是基础教育阶段，传统教育的框架都极度僵化。 无论是 Alpha 面向中小学，还是 HAA 针对大学阶段的探索，其核心都在于联合打破教育可能性的天花板。Joe Liemandt 充满信心地指出，孩子们的能力和潜力远远超出所有成年人的常规预期，全新的教育机制将帮助他们跃升至崭新的高度。对话在对新一代创业者与教育革新的期待中圆满结束，播客最后提示了节目收听渠道以及 a16z 相关的免责与投资披露声明。 ## Notable quotes > `05:00` Are you willing to redesign your school day so kids love it more than vacation? — Joe Liemandt > `30:00` You want to attract the right people and repel the wrong people who want to be laggards. — Joe Liemandt > `10:00` So one of the things that a learning engine can do that a teacher in front of a classroom with 30 people can't do is make sure the kid gets an unending stream of learning lessons and questions that's 80 to 85 percent accurate. — Joe Liemandt > `20:00` You need to reinvent the format in order to create motivation so they actually learn things. — Gagan Biyani ## Mentioned Alpha School, Horowitz and Andreessen Academy, Joe Liemandt, Gagan Biyani, Erik Torenberg, 沃顿商学院, 麻省理工学院, 斯坦福大学, 德克萨斯大学, 哈佛大学, 史蒂夫·乔布斯, 比尔·乔伊, 斯科特·麦克尼利, 彼得·蒂尔, 蒂尔奖学金, 福布斯, 麦克斯·列夫琴, 埃隆·马斯克, 里德·霍夫曼, 大卫·萨克斯, 黄仁勋, 英伟达, 萨姆·奥特曼, 萨提亚·纳德拉, 泰勒·考恩, Rational Optimist, Anthropic, Case 拖拉机, GeoGuessr, a16z ## Video description What should school look like if AI can help students learn dramatically faster? Alpha School founder Joe Liemandt argues the answer isn’t to fill the extra time with more academics, but to redesign school around the skills traditional classrooms struggle to teach: agency, teamwork, entrepreneurship, communication, and doing hard things. Joe joins Erik Torenberg and Horowitz and Andreessen Academy co-founder Gagan Biyani to discuss Alpha’s model, where students spend two hours a day on core academics and the rest developing real-world skills through projects. They explore what that approach can teach higher education, why motivation may matter more than curriculum, and how HAA is applying similar principles to college-age students by putting building, relationships, and real-world experience at the center of the learning experience. They also discuss what parents need to believe before choosing a new educational model, why Joe expects AI to drive an explosion in entrepreneurship, and why the most important question for students may not be which field is safest from AI, but what they care enough about to build. [Source](https://mgln.ai/e/1344/afp-848985-injected.calisto.simplecastaudio.com/3f86df7b-51c6-4101-88a2-550dba782de8/episodes/2967fdc6-98e7-4e58-83f8-6ebcb4e41546/audio/128/default.mp3?aid=rss_feed&awCollectionId=3f86df7b-51c6-4101-88a2-550dba782de8&awEpisodeId=2967fdc6-98e7-4e58-83f8-6ebcb4e41546&feed=JGE3yC0V)

[5:00] Joe Liemandt: Are you willing to redesign your school day so kids love it more than vacation? [30:00] Joe Liemandt: You want to attract the right people and repel the wrong people who want to be laggards. [10:00] Joe Liemandt: So one of the things that a learning engine can do that a teacher in front of a classroom with 30 people can't do is make sure the kid gets an unending stream of learning lessons and questions that's 80 to 85 percent accurate. [20:00] Gagan Biyani: You need to reinvent the format in order to create motivation so they actually learn things.

[5:00] Joe Liemandt: Kids love to do hard things and they love to do hard things with their friends. [5:00] Joe Liemandt: Are you willing to redesign your school day so kids love it more than vacation? [54:57] Joe Liemandt: Kids are awesome; they can do way more than all of us expect. [45:00] Gagan Biyani: So the question of what field should I study so that I can be sure that I'm resilient to the future is not the right question. So the question is, what field am I interested in? [30:00] Joe Liemandt: You want to attract the right people and repel the wrong people who want to be laggards.

[0:00] Are you willing to redesign your school day so kids love it more than vacation? With cognitive science and learning science, plus the advent of LLMs, you can build a learning engine that teaches kids 10 times faster. The shift that I think you've been able to make is the believability of it. Pretty soon people are going to ask, why would we ever do it any other way? I want this next generation to be the ones who are optimistically capable with AI and saying, we're going to build an awesome future. is to go build that world. - What would you say to the parent who's saying, I'm sending my kid to Ivy League school. I know it's not perfect, but this is a new institution. Why should I take a risk? - So, if AI can help students learn the traditional curriculum dramatically faster, What should they do with the rest of their education? In this episode, I sit down with Alpha School founder Joe Lamont and Horowitz and Andreessen Academy co-founder Gagan Biani to talk about what school should look like in the AI era. Joe has spent years building Alpha around a radically different model. Students spend roughly two hours a day on core academics, then use the rest of their time developing skills like teamwork, entrepreneurship, communication, and leadership through real-world projects. and how those lessons change when applied to college-age students at AJA. That includes why motivation matters so much, why students should be building alongside people operating at the frontier, and why learning can increasingly happen in service of solving a real-world problem, rather than simply passing a test. And ultimately, we make the case for a different way of preparing young people for AI, not by trying to predict which careers will survive, but by giving them the agency, relationships, and tools to help build what comes next. you Joe, welcome to the podcast. Thank you very much. So we've had the luxury of spending some time together this year and touring the schools. And what you've built with Alpha is just Incredible. And it's inspired us at HA. We're grateful to have your involvement. And for people who are unfamiliar, why don't you just briefly describe what you think of as the central innovations or what you've really brought to the space with Alpha? Sure. So we're reinventing how K-12 school is, the school day, right? How kids spend their six or seven hours that they're in class or in a school building. What is that like? And sort of the first part that you have to understand and buy into is that instructional design and delivery hasn't changed for a hundred years, right? We throw a teacher in front of the classroom and what's the right way to do this. And now, If you look over the last couple decades with cognitive science and learning science, plus the advent of LLMs, you can build a learning engine that teaches kids 10 times faster. Right. And so as soon as you have that ability where kids can learn 10 times faster than they could the last 100 years with the teacher in front of a classroom model, the question is, what do you do with it? And so that's what we're doing at Alpha, which is how do you reinvent the school day? And so on our model, we make three commitments to the kids, which the first is they love school. And I just got the surveys back last week. Ninety some percent of our kids say I love school. Fifty percent of the kids at the school said I would rather go to school than go on vacation. I actually have one campus where it's at 65 percent of the kids are like, I'd rather go to school than vacation. And so build a school where kids love it if you're going to be there for 12 years. part with this engine, what we do is the kids learn twice as much in two hours a day as sitting in class for six and doing homework. And so it's two hours a day, right, of the academics, and they learn more, which if you're compounding and learning twice as much as you would at your other school, right, you're going to get the top 1%, you know, sort of no matter where you start given time. And so the kids crush it on standardized tests for the best academic performing school. And then you do the rest of the day? And I think that's a whole thing of what we're talking about now. I believe now every school, and it doesn't matter, K-12, university, has to say if the traditional way and the traditional curriculum is now 10 times faster, what do you do with the rest of the day? And as a principal, I can definitely tell you the one thing parents would hate is if I sent the kids home. after two hours, right? You got them all day, six, seven hours a day, right? And the kids want to be there and they love it. So what we do is it's what are all the life skills that we consider critical to thriving in the world that's coming? The world's changing. What do we do? And so we have five categories. of life skills, leadership and teamwork, entrepreneurship and financial literacy, socialization, relationship building, storytelling, public speaking, grit, hard work. And so then you're doing projects in a group with all your friends, with an adult who's writing them, and that's how you spend your afternoon the rest of the day. We were just in Austin. Then we added 12 campuses last year. We're up to 50. Demand's insane. That - Yeah. [5:00] this new thing. We're sort of first, but everybody's going to have to look at this. Today, no one believes, oh, it's a two hour work and we have to get scale and more proof points. But once you realize, wow, kids could learn everything they need to in two hours. Yeah. Every family, every head of school, everybody, every education minister around the world is going to say, how do we rebuild the school day, right, for the next hundred years? Because we don't need to do it like we did the last hundred. Yeah, I remember visiting Alpha six years ago. This is before you were full time on it. And I immediately got it because I've been in learning science and sort of education for 15 to 20 years. But I will say that the shift that I think you've been able to make is the believability of it. And I think you've done a great job of figuring out how to show that not only does this work, but pretty soon people are going to ask, why would we ever do it any other way? And that's really the brilliance of, from a business standpoint, what you've accomplished over the last five years, I think. Yeah, I became principal four years ago and my background is product, right, in entrepreneurship. And this just needed sort of product packaging. How do you productize this into something that is understandable and scalable, right? That's the other part is it's really hard to scale schools. How do you scale in the quality? And so that's for my first three years, it was how to do that. And that's actually one of the big benefits of bringing AI is it helps you scale at high quality. Our phrase is we get better as we get bigger. you look at anything over the last four years, our test scores, customer sat, student, happiness, the quality of the workshops, all of those get better every year because the system gets better as it gets bigger. Yeah. We have a number of teammates, colleagues, friends who send their kids off on, do you see the kids love it? And I remember hating my day to 12 experience. Is it this two hour sort of arrangement? What is it that you find is most contributing to kids loving it that other schools should be adopting? And similarly, we were also talking off camera about how motivation is underrated or maybe one of the biggest elements in terms of what is kids. How are you tackling that as well? Yeah, I think the biggest thing is ed tech historically hasn't done well in schools, hasn't had the impact that people wanted. And if you look at this learning engine and say, oh, this is like ed tech and I'm just going to put it into a normal school day, it'll fail. It'll be just like everything else. And when I talk to somebody who hears about alpha and they hear all this learning engine, one question, and this is the core of everything, which is, are you willing to redesign your school day so kids love it more than And if you have a head of school who says that, then you're all set. Right. And that motivation falls under that, actually, which is if you are waking up and saying, how am I going to make kids love this? That is the core of what allows us to do everything else. And people are worried when they hear that of, oh, it's Disneyland and they're just running around and they're not learning or it's not regular games and all these things. And it's literally just the opposite, which is one of the things we talk about is the key to your love to do hard things and they love to do hard things with their friends. If it was just playing video games all day, they can go do that at home. But to sit there and say, I want to do this instead of vacation, it's because they're doing challenging things with their friends that they love. It's not hard. Like an example, like an easy example is, so like teamwork, right? And uplifting your classmates as a team. You know, in traditional school, they don't teach this. After school sports, absolutely in America, teamwork, leadership. But in schools, they don't. Actually, most team one person does it, everybody else just sits around, right? You always remember those, they were terrible, right? And so you learn the opposite of teamwork. You learn like the anti-pattern. And in our school, Actually, a good indication of that is the Wharton has an MBA challenge where they have a simulation that you take and it's go up Mount Everest. Fifty percent of MBAs fail the teamwork because they never were taught teamwork sort of their whole, you know, stack through school. We take every third grader and we mic them up and we throw them into an escape room. Right. And they're all getting through the escape room. And at the end of it, we have AI analyze the transcript. What percent? of your language? Were you team oriented? Were you helping or were you? And the answer, I can give you the answer. Less than 20 percent of the language is uplifting, fighting and pushing and my idea, right? All these different things. And so we have an eight week workshop for this and they go through it and they keep going back to the teamwork and to graduate, right, to pass the class, they have to get up to 85 percent. of team behavior. And we also show them that they finish the escape room three times faster. Yeah. When you're doing team environment. And that's just a great, fun way. Kids love it. It's a life skill that every parent's like, oh, that's the stuff I want my kids to learn. Yeah. And because they don't have to sit in class all day, they can do that. And then fourth and fifth grade, right? Our life skills curriculum is as rigorous as our core passive physics. [10:00] test or a math test is you have to pass the escape room test. You know, in fourth and fifth grade, we actually make them pass the Wharton MBA challenge that 50% of the MBAs can. And you take a fourth and fifth grader and they pass it that back to being proud and excited and wanting to do it. You can engage them and teach these skills much younger. And I believe as we look at the world today. We haven't had the capability to teach kids all this at a much younger age because you're sitting in class all day. But now that we can, of course, we must. So the reason they're enjoying it is because they can feel themselves learning faster, growing faster, building deeper relationships, and just. overall, that's something you can't get on vacation. Yeah. Well, it's like that. That escape room, it's a high bar for your parents. The second is, to your point of what else... Kids. You know, kids don't like school. A lot of kids, let's talk academics versus life school. There's sort of two different, different. On the academic side, kids don't like to do things they fail at. That's true on academics. That's true on anything. That's why in America we hold kids back on sports, right? Because you want to give them, they're bigger, right? Then all of a sudden they're playing better and they win and then they get the accolades and okay, right? And you get them on that path. And then academics in America, because we're a time-based system, right? Once you fall behind... Right. Then it's just now it's torture the rest of the time. Right. Wherever you fall behind. Right. And it's just it's your end. In our system, because our learning engine will give you a personalized lesson, right? It doesn't matter what your age grade is. You can be in eighth grade, and if you need a fifth grade lesson, because whatever, before you came to Alpha, you missed it. It's going to give you the fifth grade lesson, right? And you're going to be able to do it and you're going to be able to get it You're going to be able to pass it and then move forward. And so, you know, we engineer wins for the kids in the academics that, you know, if you had to say the core value of what the engine does is, you know, for the kids, you basically want kids in this 80 to 85 percent. correct zone, right? Like just what percent of the time, if you're engaging with something, is it too easy or too hard? If it's a hundred percent correct, it's too easy. You're not even learning anything. You're just regurgitating what you know. And any video game developer will tell you if you drop below two thirds and you're failing more than two thirds of the time, you're going to disengage. So one of the things that. you know, a learning engine can do that a teacher in front of a classroom with 30 people can't do is make sure the kid gets an unending stream of learning. lessons and questions that's 80 to 85 percent accurate right and we can just do it and if it gets too hard right we can give them scaffolding lessons to catch up right too easy you progress and faster through the material and if you keep kids engaged because you're giving them work they can do right then they like that and when kids actually do well right and you hold them to high standards right they get very excited you know and just they see themselves crushing their academics with it. And when they're doing well, Right. They know they love that. Gagan, I'm curious how you think about this conversation and what Alpha is doing, you know, and how that informs what we're doing with AJA. Incredibly inspired. I think that I've been inspired by Alpha School since I first visited. And I'm It proves, I think, the thesis that we have at the Horowitz and Dresden Academy that if you redesign the system for the modern era with modern tools, that you can have – everything that you want in terms of outcomes. You can have more network. A lot of people say you go to school for network. We're going to take your network and make it 10x better. Everyone says you're going to go to school to become a better person. Like Horowitz and Dresden Academy absolutely wants you to become a better person. We're going to engineer the system so that you're more likely to become a positive sum human. You want to have high agency and you want to do hard things like Alpha has given me a lot of inspiration on how to ensure that students get that. I think the one difference is that at every age range, you have to do something very different. So if you actually listen to Joe talk, you're going to be able to do something very different. K-8, high school, very different. When you go from high school to college era, very different. And so now all of a sudden you have to make the right changes. You can't just copy everything over. And so ultimately, if you have a student-centric mindset, if you just told the leaders of any major university in the country that their number one job and no other job was to make sure and I'm sure that there would be many great schools in the United States. Unfortunately, there aren't many because most university leaders are required to spend 90% of their time focused on all the adults around them and not enough on the students. And one of the things you see with [15:00] Rose is always talking about the kids. Yeah. Joe, I'm curious, you've very generously gotten involved with HA as an investor and advisor. What excited you about what we're up to? And how have you thought about the differences between college and high school? So I'm super excited because I absolutely believe that university needs to be reinvented just like we have in K-12. So anything I could do to help, I want it. One, I need places for alpha kids to go. Yeah. Right. There's, you know, there's gonna be a whole set of kids who are like, I want to go there. And, you know, and so what have we done? You know, what have you thought about? To your point, it's completely different, right? Each, each, our high school is very different than our K-8. And I believe university needs to be different. And I don't believe the whole concept of, you know, is university, is everybody just going to come out of high school and not go to university anymore? I actually don't think that's true. believe is a huge opportunity to reinvent university and make it awesome. No one wants to go to a bad school, right. And where it's terrible and it's not getting the kids ready. You know, as an example, we got, we had, um, Ah. We had over 70 MIT and Stanford kids and UT came to Alpha this summer as interns. And part of what we were saying is, tell us about university. How's it going? You know, what do you think? And I was like, how many of you guys expect that, you know, this university getting you ready, whatever one you're going to, is getting you ready for the world when you graduate? And one kid raped it. Yeah. Like, it was just like, I was like, seriously, like, none of you? And they're like, we're terrified. We do not feel. You know, we worked, you know, our 12 years really hard to get into these great universities. And now we're terrified that, you know, when it comes time to graduate, there's not going to be those jobs that you used to get coming out of it. You know, those first one and two year jobs aren't aren't there. You know, an AI is going to be doing it. So what what do we do? And so we they spent a lot of time this summer as interns, you know, coming up with what they thought, you know, would be, you know, reinvention of university and what they would want. And, you know, and back to kids wanting to do hard things, right? You know, these, they were interns and they came in and they came up, you know, we're going to build this educational LLM, you know, so we can make it free for everybody in the world because every sovereign is going to need its own, you know, LLM, educational LLM, small language models, It sits on a device. And those kids worked 80 hours a week, right? Figuring out, doing research, figuring out the concepts of learning, right? They're going to be published, right? And, you know, at the end of it, they're like, this is what we would love the university to be. We're all working together on the super hard thing, right? That has meaningful impact to the world, right? That could really help change the world. I wish these could be classes at, you know, MIT and Stanford and UT. But they're not. Right. And that's when I think about what you guys are doing of reinventing it and letting kids really build. Right. It's not just about the classes. It's about getting ready for the real world and all those skills you need. I believe those are different at university, but I'm very excited about what you're. You're building around that. - Yeah, I think it's really important to... uh, understand that an average student who's going to university who's really ambitious, they need to get their hands dirty. Like, They are entering the real world in three to four years. And it's super critical for them to be going and building things and understanding what it's like and making mistakes and dealing with the challenges. And, you know, I really love that you said that they were studying as part of the 80 hours. So they're in Austin for an 80 hour a week internship. And you mentioned studying. And I'm guessing you didn't assign any textbooks. No, they and back to this, they had to go do all the research to an LLM. So they literally are researching learning science, researching it. We have this data structure called the brain lift, and they were working hard on what would be considered classical stuff you need to do at a university. But it wasn't just the studying part. It was how do you apply it and be a builder, right? And I think your point of getting ready is it's both. Well, you talk about learning as being 90% motivation. And when you're 18 years old, building things that people will use. You're motivated by revenue and getting a job and that kind of thing. And so why not make the entire learning experience driven by that motivation and using that motivation to actually go and learn things? Because my concern with college is, I mean, I know Eric and I had this experience. We've talked about it like [20:00] I didn't learn very much because I did not like the format. And to be honest, now I go to Stanford's campus, or someone else's campus, and I'm No one seems to like the format. So 20 years ago, I was a little bit in the minority, maybe 20% of students agreed with me. Our classes were about half full, I would say, in attendance. I hear they're now way under 10% full. You know, people are, students are not finding the format to work. You need to reinvent the format in order to create motivation so they actually learn things. And that's one of the main focuses of the academy. No, I think another example is, you know, ago. And so at Christmas, after they'd all been, you know, at university, I, you know, I got them together. I was like, how's it going? Like, how do you do in real? Because that's right. How do you do in university after you come out? And they're like, okay, we love it. They all had four O's. They were crushing it. And, but they were like, these hundred series lecture classes are a complete waste of time. Five of them had written editorials to their school paper about how it's just a charade, how the kids come in or like scrolling TikTok or, you know, on their are not showing up and the teachers are, you know, teaching and they're just like, those don't need to exist anymore. Right now. I was like, well, what do you like? And they're like, oh, there's all these great small group seminars we're working on. you know, clubs and all the activities around it. You know, a university is a bundle of products, right? And they liked, you know, the bundle, but the actual academic part of like these big lecture classes and stuff, they're like, that needs to go away. Yeah. And what's crazy is that that academic part that you're talking about is the only thing the university formally provides. So it's actually the rest of the bundle is student driven. Yeah. takes up about 50% of the time. Right. Well, so I just I dropped out of Stanford. Right. And I was this kid. Yeah. Which was it didn't take up 50 percent. But if you go if you go to the classes, it takes 50 percent. But back to my experience there. And, you know, for the couple of years I was there, it was great because of all the other things. The people I met, you know, Steve Jobs came down. Right. Yeah. I was giving a talk. And one of my friends went and was working next. And, you know, Bill Joy and Scott McDealy would come and talk. with them afterward or have lunch, all of those experiences that you had of who you met and, you know, seeing the real world, plus building stuff with my friends, right, that eventually became our company, right? That was what was great about the product to me. And sitting in these lecture classes were, you know, the opposite of that. Yeah. One thing we've talked about is how to make the students love it. But of course, you know, an even more important constitution in the conversations you're having with parents are evolving where it relates to, you know, early education or higher education and some of the advice that you give them. Great. So, you know, yeah. So I I talk to tens of thousands of parents now, you know, sort of in the K-12. Yeah. K-12 range. And I've been shocked actually at the switch, which is there's still some families who are like, you know, I'm a kindergarten parent and I want to see the direct path right into the Aggie League. But an equal number, maybe even more of parents who went to Stanford or Harvard who are like, no, I know I don't want my kid on that path. How are you going to get them ready for a world that's not that? this alternative path because when they look, especially even in kindergarten, they're looking forward 12 years from now and they're like, you know, What am I going to do? You know, how are you preparing my kid for the world? And my their vision of the world is, yes, I went to the Ivy League, but that's not going to be for my kid. I don't think that's going to get him ready. And if you're telling me that, I don't I don't want your I don't want your K-12 school. And so that's happening a lot now. And they're they're looking for what what are they? Because I think there's recognition now, you know, versus maybe last 30 or 40 years that the world is really changing. Right. talking to you, the parents are sort of done. They're like, just get my kid into college, right? Or, you know, they're sort of like, I've been on this route and I'm at the five yard line. I'm not throwing all the cards up in the air. But when you look younger, right, those parents are like, There's just no way that the current path is going to be the right one. And so when I think, you know, of this – I would expect, and I don't know when you get your demand, you're going to have massive demand from all the kids, right? Who are going to be like, okay, I have to go do this. It's so obvious. This is awesome. And then you will have to have a separate sales job, right? With the parents, right? To show them, look, while it wasn't the way you did it, right? This. [25:00] the way. And, you know, um, you know, there's, there, there, there's a historical precedent for this that, um, you know, might be useful for you, right. If, if you want to go through it, which is, you know, in 1910, you know, 90% of America had an eighth grade education. Um, there were no high schools based on, right. And over 30% of America is a farmer, right. And so everybody's on the farm. Eighth grade was enough. You're working the fields, right in high school. And then in 1910, the tractor, case tractor rolled up on the American farm, right? And literally you can go look at the ads. It literally looks like an anthropic ad, you know, does the work of 50 programmers, does the work of 50 farmhands. And literally everybody in America realized 30% of the jobs are going away, right? My kids and grandkids, we've been doing this for generations. It's gone. That path is gone. And we have to get our kids ready for this new future. And it was that same recognition, I think, that parents have today. The traditional path is those jobs. It's the kids coming in the summer where they're like, I'm going to get out of Stanford MIT I not going to have a job But what America did back then is 130 pounds and thirty thousand pounds Right We used to have a it was they voted to actually raise their taxes And this is the key part. Fund an education that they'd never experienced. They'd never seen a high school curriculum. They'd never been to high school. Right. They had an eighth grade education, but they knew they had to do something different than their background. Right. They had to see the world differently to get their kids ready. right, and get them the good jobs, which back then that school system became the industrial system we've had the last hundred years. It served us really well for 100 years. But now it's time for the next change. And you're going to have to convince the families to be like those 1910, you know, rural farmers who realized, while I haven't experienced and it's different than what I did, this is what my kid needs to thrive in the future. Yeah. And what would you say to the parent who's saying, you know, hey, I'm sending my kid to an Ivy League school. I know it's not perfect, but this is a new institution. You know, why should I take a risk? Why would you consider taking a risk on the academy? Yeah. So I been living this actually at the K level now for four years It is one where back to the lucky part is you don need everybody There's going to be that set. When I talk to families, it's an adoption curve just like any other one. There's a set of families who absolutely realize the current system is just not there. right? Or the people who sit there and say, I feel it, but I just need to be, you know, moved over. You know, the number, you know, both my daughters, right, you know, were told they're not going to get into college, you know, when they were in eighth grade, you know, if they went to alpha and they had to go to a traditional school, right? And there was just no chance that, you know, that would occur. And so you're there, there is that, you know, dichotomy, but for parents, you know, if you look, you know, sort of across the families who went to alpha four years ago, right. And the ones who didn't, you know, went to alpha high versus not, there's a lot of more families who are like, I totally should have sent my kid to alpha, right That I went the traditional path right I thought it was the safe path and it totally wasn And look at how those Alpha kids are thriving And I thought those guys were crazy and risky but now looking at the reality of what happened with my kid who didn go to Alpha versus those, they regret it. And, you know, I believe that you have to get through the first year because you don't have any data, but one year in, people are going to see that the students are thriving, right? And once you see that, then that's the comparison. And I'll even go back to my own experience on this, which is, I sort of am talking very positive and optimistic, but I didn't start out for 12 years ago, right? Mackenzie Price and Brian did. And, you know, I went to Catholic school, my kids were in Catholic school. I didn't like it, but, you know, parents want their kids educated the way they are. That's the legacy. That's the problem, right? That's what you have to overcome. And so my kids are in Catholic school. And, you know, and Mackenzie's like, well, come to my new school, right? And I dropped out of college. Like, I started a startup at a garage. I'm like, schools shouldn't be in a garage. Like, it's so weird. You have a janky, weird school, McKinsey. And I was totally right. I was right. And then it took two years for me. So I was the slow, right? It took me two years to move over. And then finally, that was 10 years ago and it obviously turned out great for our [30:00] family. But I look at that, my kids still yell at me for being slow those two years, right? They're like, you should have started earlier, dad. But that concept of, you know, finding those families. And so we travel all around the country, right? We've opened 50 campuses, you know, and you get, you know, a thousand people in the info session and you're like, who wants to be the first 10, who wants to be the first 25 or 50, right? And a year ago when we were opening the 12 campuses, and we couldn't get 25. right? We would get, you know, 10, right? We opened New York City with, you know, 10 or 12. And now the campus is full, right? 150,000. you know, total people. Yeah. And, you know, they had to go see... the first ones that it works and then it's there. So your first, the first class is always those people who are like, I know it's bad. I want to jump in. What you will see immediately and sort of what we're seeing on the demand is people who, just need someone to go first. And you, once you get that first and it works, the demand just skyrockets. And the benefits of being first are high. You know, what I see in colleagues and friends who are sending their kids to Alpha or even, you know, friends who've done some of the Teal Fellowship, which is also small application numbers in the beginning, is those people who are applying early have the courage of their conviction. It's positive self-selection. And so you're around some of the most brilliant people, some of the most courageous people, both on the kid level and the parent level. And it's really Back to advice on it. You absolutely want the families who are both sides, right? All in because people, It is. There will be hiccups, right? There's just there's hiccups that happen. And for sure. And, you know, it's just it's part of it when you're starting. And someone who's super skeptical and on the, you know, the late adopter side, they're just going to not right there. It's going to destroy them. Yeah. They won't be able to handle it. The people who are over here who really want the product. Right. We talk about magnet marketing. You want to attract the right people and repel the wrong people who want to be laggards. I don't like A.I. or screen time. You know, that's a set of people in the infositions say that I'm like, you shouldn't come. You know, if you can't balance, right, what this offering is, it's being clear on your product definition is a thing that I don't think most schools do. But if you're clear on your product definition, this is what we are, this we're not, it helps you find those right group and exactly what you talk about. When the right groups together, right, because part of its community, right, you're building the community there, all the kids who are there. And the parent community does matter when you're doing startup. and I believe it'll be the same for what you're doing. Yeah. Yeah, I think that makes me think of two things. One is I think we're going to be pretty strict about who gets in and less about class size. You've told me this. I've heard this. I think that's a very important lesson. The second lesson, I think, is that – Thank you. This is the type of thing where you don't want most people to want it. You want the people who really want it to do it. And then actually I'll add one more thing, which is we did make it one year and it's not no tuition the first year. So it is also a little bit less risky than, you know, you're missing eighth grade and you can't repeat, you know, you don't want to miss eighth grade, but. If you take one year detour from college, you can always go back. It's really no different. So I do think that's one of the things we have the benefit. It's interesting to see the nuances of a college experience versus a high school experience because the stakes are different in different directions. I believe that is going to be one of your assets with the parents on the one year is. There's no downside, right? There's no downside to trying it. Right. And you can always defer at some other college or reapply. And so you're not you're not. you know, shutting down other options. And, you know, and just to the parent stuff, what you'll see is, you know, when your kid loves it, back to school as being 90% probation. I just, you know, if I was talking to the parents here, their kid really wants to go, I just give you advice for all the stuff is just let them go do it, right? Yeah. Let's even just say, it doesn't work out for him, right? And whatever. It'll be the best learning experience of their life, right? And they'll be ready to do the other. And fighting that the other way, it just isn't. That's riskier. No, it's much riskier. And we can go to a lot of stories I have of those at our high school level. Well, I think that's actually, if you think about the three of us, and there are actually many people we all know who are like us, who didn't love school at some point. disliked the most. And for me, it was that I was being forced to do things that I was not bought into. Like my agency had started to grow 13, 14, 15 years old. [35:00] and I started to, you know, see the emperor had no clothes. And I started to, to believe like, wait a second, my teacher doesn't actually know how to teach math. Like this might not be the best way to teach math. Oh shoot. So I got to take this stupid test now, you know? And, um, So I think that one of the pedagogical philosophies of the academy and of Alpha is that you design it around the student, to increase the chance that you, or to decrease the chance that you get that rebellion. And instead, if you have buy-in, they're much more likely to thrive and do things. And so, you know. No, and I think that's, and I'll tell the personal story on this, which is, you know, I, during my K-12, I was always in trouble, right? I would skip at school all the time. I did the minimum to get into Stanford, you know, and then I dropped out, right? And when I dropped out, my dad had a famous quote that was like on Forbes or whatever, you know, my son's a moron. And, you know, sort of, right. And he was not happy. And, Um, But then the part that didn't get in the article was a couple years later. So I dropped out and then I started my company. And it was awesome. And then all of a sudden I'm working 100 hours a week and we're sleeping under the desks. And it's just crazy, crazy, crazy. And two years later, he's like, I got to change my mind. This was the greatest thing ever that you dropped out. He's like, I have to admit, I was really worried that you were going to be a lazy little shit. career. Right. And he was like, as a dad, you know, I was just terrified that I had done poorly. And he's like, now I see that now that you're doing what you love, right. You're fully engaged. God, I should have, you know, gotten this done earlier. And I think that's the same thing. When you have a student, like when we talk about building a school, they love more than vacation. You're engaging around stuff they love. Right. And when you do that, that's what causes all the parents who say, my kid changed in a month. It's because we have them doing hard things that they And all of a sudden it does change and it's that quick. Right. And and having a school where your kid wants to go to it because they're going to be doing hard things. Right. Is, you know, is as as is it's a great thing. And I believe that's why one of the reasons why I think this can be a home run because you're going to get all these kids. Right. Who are like, I know it's hard. I want to go do this. I can coast through normal school and I'm not going to pick that path. Instead, I'm going to pick this. And this is going to be harder than all schools. Right. Yeah. And what you're doing for all of those. And and that's the you know, that's part of it. And and kids love it. You know, we have we have in our high school, we have a world school where they're spending a year in Africa, a year of service. And they have to sign a contract that's like, I realize this will be the hardest year of my life. Right. And they all sign it and they all love it. And they're super excited to go. Right. And I believe this is sort of the equivalent. of that. By the way, one note, I've spent a fair amount of time in Africa. I would send some kids to India or Sri Lanka. It's going to be much harder. Okay. Well, that'll be on the list. It's called World School. I'm just kidding. I think Africa, that's such an amazing thing that you're doing. One of our wishes that we've talked about, we have a stipend. We don't talk about this And my personal goal, now they get to decide how they use the travel budget. I'm not going to force anything on anyone. But my personal goal is that a lot of them go solo to countries with less than $20,000 GDP per capita. That's a great idea. I love that. No, I totally love it. I think that's super valuable. Yeah, you learn so much about yourself and about life. And I think that it also will provide perspective that will help in business, of course. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it's so funny going back to this idea of, you know, kids who are, the story you mentioned, your parents, it reminds me of kids like us when we were younger and others who are quote unquote lazy in school and that they, you know, don't get 4.0 because they're just not bought in. But when they find the thing, they're willing to put 100 hour weeks there's so many people like that. And conversely, there are people on the other side who will get straight A's. But once you take away the structure, they haven't really cultivated this inner desire or this ability to find what they love. And when they get to the working world, in which the skill is just remarkably different, they can't operate in the same way. And it just strikes me that we're going to just create the space, and you're creating the space from much earlier age, where people really get to get in touch with what they care about, be much more No, that, you know, the correct that those are what are all the life skills? That's when we talk about a holistic person. It's not just what their GPA is. And you can you can max, you know. score max on just your grades, but that is not something that means you do well in the real world. And I think parents actually [40:00] Do you realize that? You know, you need to be more well-rounded. They just don't have a path of doing it. And I believe that one of the things back to reinventing university, you're going to show them here's all these things that should be part of the university curriculum, not a club after the kids, you know, optionally do. And so I think that's going to be a great, a great thing. I think employers obviously realize the same thing. Yeah, the employers seem very bought in, honestly. Yeah, that part of the whole thing is there's no problem on that pitch, which is, right, the number of employers are like these kids coming out, right, don't have the skills and capability to do it. And it is that, you know, they, well, if you had just taken me, you know, before I actually started my company and looked at me and said, you know, are you ready for a job? Yeah, right. This, you know, non-academic project, then I'm like, I'm probably pretty good employee to hire. learn those things is to actually just interact with lots of people, have to build complex systems, right? And being able to, forcing yourself to deal with the reality of rejection, and sort of the maturation process of not having things structured for you, but having to structure them yourself. Yeah, no, those back to AI commoditizing intelligence, right, and scoring on this when you can ask it, you're like, well, what is what are the human traits you want? Right. And it is it's leadership, right? It's being able to work in a team. It's agency, right? It's ownership. It's receive feedback, as you say, all of those skills, right, that you have to have that you can get from doing projects. Yeah, but you don't get from sitting in class. Yeah. There's a lot of questions around what is AI doing to coding? What is AI doing to math? What's it going to do to physics? If you were, knowing what you know now, but if you were 18 years old today with your interests, how would you think about if you had the flexibility at something like HAA to kind of design your own education, how would you think about what you would be motivated to learn based on where you see the world going and your own interests? Right. And AI allows you to fill your head with knowledge 10 times faster. Yeah. Right. So these these kids can become domain experts in their field that they want to faster than ever. Right. I mean, I have kids in my high school who are rebuilding the time back software stack that I wrote. Right. And they're becoming experts in learning science and being able to do this. Right. which wasn't able to be done before in high school. So the cognitive onload part, Because it's 10 times faster, you do it and it doesn't take that long. Yeah. Right. And so I can get the equivalent of a master's, you know, while I'm, you know, in a year. Right. And, you know, do that part. But then the second part is the AI gives you a chance to be a builder. Right. It gives you superpowers to build like no one else. Right. And I believe that's the kids who are at your university is they're going to realize I want to build something. I'm a learn faster than I ever have. Whatever prereq, just like those the interns this summer were doing it. Right. right, learning all this stuff, but they were doing it doing it to build. And I believe just, you know, if you talk to our high school kids at Alpha High, they're definitely not doomers about like AI in the future. They're like, you adults are cooked. Like we're coming for you and we have superpowers. Yeah. Right. And they do like that is this kid. They really do. No, these kids who are building like these apps. I'm like, you know, my, you know, I'm like, Two years from now, I absolutely expect most learning software is going to be written by students. Most students are going to learn from learning software written by their peers, right? Because it'll embed all the learning science concepts, all these things, and they will make it much more engaging, right? And we have plenty of data around that already. You know, shout out to Austin who built our AP curriculum. And he built this crazy great curriculum. And all our kids who took it got a five on their APs, you know. But he did it because he built this geo guessing game where he took all these world history events and, you know, and did an S tier ranking with a snarky AI. Anyway, all these things that I'm throwing those words out because I don't actually know what he really, you know, what they mean. But every kid was like engaged and loved it and did it. And I'm like, OK, me and the old adult team are never going to be able to build that ever, you know. And so I think that's that's what these kids. [45:00] they're going to be able to do is they're going to go build the future. Yeah. Right. And AI gives them the capability to build the future and start. Freshman year of college. Just to take a stab at your question, Eric, you know, I think the question of what field should I study so that I can be sure that I'm resilient to the future is not the right question. So the question is, what field am I interested in? Yeah. And I think there's enough information. I have enough faith that if you're an AI native in any field, It does not matter. You know, a lot of people are concerned about coding or math. Look. There's going to be a whole new type of coding and math that happens with the AI native mathematicians. It's just that the old school ones who are still doing chalkboard and pencil and paper are cooked. But the new students who love math, they're going to do just fine. In fact, they're going to go and do things none of us ever thought possible. And so there's going to be a whole new era of mathematicians that are going to be successful. So I think – and that's actually, by the way, something that we're trying to screen for a lot at HAA. Which is that we really don't want someone who's like, I want to make sure I'm resilient to the future. It's a very defensive way of approaching the world. And we want you to be on offense. We want you to say, what are you interested in? I'm going to go figure it out. You know, as an example, I work in education. Education has not been the most lucrative founder field of the last 15, 20 years, right? Like, it just so happens that I built one of, like, four wins in education in the last 15 years, right? Like, literally. It is a terrible market. Yeah. It's been historically a terrible market. We're going to change that. We absolutely are going to change that. But— I'm still super happy and proud that this is what I work on. And I still feel like I know how to operate at the level and quality of someone who's doing something in AI or doing something in SaaS or whatever. I've chosen a field. I love it. I have a very healthy and fulfilling life. I'm not a billionaire, but I'm doing well. And I think anyone who gets to that level in any field, if they're in the top 1% of their field, it's going to be fine. And I love what you said, which is I actually believe very much what we have to do with with, you know, back to raising kids, right, and building high character, you know, kids for the future. Your point of they're not. This isn't passive, right? This back to what is going to happen to the world and it's going to be imposed on me. It's like, no, we're going to go make the world, right? These kids are the ones who are creating it, right? And you can have the passive view of what happens, right? And oops, it's going to be bad. Or you can be the other, which is, no, I'm building it, right? And we need to create a generation of builders who look at this optimistically, right? All our kids read rational optimist, right? they sit there and say, yes, I'm in control of it. Right. And we need to build our future. And we need to raise the next generation and have our kids coming out of university. Sort of, you They I look at the world and I'm like, I want this next generation coming out of university to be the ones who are optimistically capable with AI and saying we're going to build an awesome future. Right. That's what our job as educators are, is to go build that world and make sure that our universities do that. Joe, this was an amazing conversation. I think the last thing that I'm thinking about is you're actually building an entrepreneurial school, right? For high school students called Founders School. Can you tell us a little bit about, why you built it, how it works and why you think it's a good model for us to be inspired by? Sure. I mean, I back to skills, you know, one of our life skill stack is entrepreneurship and financial literacy. We actually have a very strong point of view of when we look at the jobs of the future. Big Fortune 500 comps are going to be smaller, you know, because of AI, but I believe it's going to be lead to an explosion of entrepreneurship, right? AI gives entrepreneurs this great opportunity and, you know, It's something we just don't teach, right? We just don't teach kids this. So we teach it. We have a stack starting in kindergarten, right? We literally teach every kindergartner, you know, how to earn and save, spend, invest, donate, right? Get that foundational going, right? We have a currency called alphas to start teaching them this. But back to entrepreneurship is not, you know, a bolt of lightning and it just happens. It's a set of skills, right, that you can teach people. And so, you know, we teach them. founders, which is sort of our peak specialized school for that. This is for kids who want to spend their high school building businesses. You know, the part that's crazy that parents don't you'll [50:00] start a business that will earn a million dollars of profit while you're in high school, or we give you all your tuition back, right? That we absolutely believe that these are skills that can be taught, right, repeatedly and reliably where I actually can build a business on that. And, you know, so it actually opened in August. We actually have from Alpha High Kids, right, people who've been able to build businesses over the last four years. So we have data points, but this is now a come in and they have to earn $100 and there's a set of skills they have to learn, then $1,000, then $10,000, $100,000 and a million dollars. And, you know, we're only a couple months in, you know, to where the process is and kids are speed running it. And we're like, Okay, they're going to earn a million dollars in the first year. Like I'm out of curriculum and they're freshmen. Right. And I'm like, okay, well, you know, and the kids are like, okay, well, I'm going to then obviously just do a bigger one after that. But that concept of can they do this? You know, can you build it? And I believe a lot of it is just, you know, there's a set of skills around it. There's also the relationships and networking. Right. And I think that's, you know, one of the things that. I believe... That you guys are bringing at the university level that we're trying to bring even down the high school level is just is is networking relationship building, you know, on the networking side. A lot of it for kids, you know, I always thought a lot of the magic of Stanford was yet all these luminaries come and then you'd meet them. And you'd be like, oh, this is like a normal human, right? Yes. I mean, they're obviously really impressive, but they're just like a normal human. And it makes it accessible to you to be able to say, well, I can do that, too. Especially when you're young and dumb and super arrogant. You're like, oh, I could do that, right? And that is part of it. And, you know, we're doing the same thing here at the high school level where they're able to build up relationships. You know, actually, one of the stories is for 14-year-olds, cold-called Jensen, right? And he literally called him and, you know, and Jensen returned the call. And, you know, realized it's a kid, you know, gave him 90 seconds, right, for his pitch. And then the end gave him like really good feedback, which basically if I had to summarize was, you know, all these qualification questions you're asking me. You could have done research or asked other people in my organization about it. And you just used your bullet with me. And you should have done your prep work and it would have been much better. Right. Instead of wasting it by calling me. So, you know, kudos for, you know, aggressiveness. But you get an F on on call prep. Yeah. OK, that call. OK, that kid. Right. He's tweeting about it. Right. Everybody in the school. It's like the best learning lesson in that kid's life. And, you know, the the you know, adults. Right. Successful adults are willing to invest in the next generation. relationship building that they're going to get at HA is just going to be, Awesome, awesome and more valuable and what normal universities, traditional universities don't do. It's something that Eric is a true expert at, if I may say so myself. You have helped us galvanize this really large network of amazing people from all disciplines to come and help the HAA students succeed. I think it's really cool what you're doing with Founders School as well. valuable for a student who's in high school or college level to have the opportunity to get access to that. Yeah, no, that is that back to for me, that's always that's the most valuable thing. And you guys are putting it intentionally at the center of what you guys do. And that's really important. Max Lepchkin was in this chair a few weeks ago and he was talking about how, hey, you know, he was inspired to think so big and so ambitiously because he worked with Elon. He worked with Reid Hoffman, with David Sachs. And he saw that they, you know, sort of went through the ups and downs. They were just like him. And, yeah, hopefully us having, you know, Jensen and Sam Altman and, you know, Satya and all these legends come and share war stories with the kids, share their ups and downs will also elevate their ambitions as well. It does. And that point he also made, which is your ambition is set, you know, when... For kids. Yeah. Somebody has to, you know, there's, I think it was Tyler Cowen who's like, the number one thing a teacher can do is raise a student's ambition for themselves. Right. We try to live that at Alpha. Absolutely. And I believe that's very much when you sit here is that it's intentionally in your guys design of the people you're getting, the culture you're building, that you're going to be raising their ambition for what they can do in life. [55:00] I think that's just so important. Yeah. Well, lastly, I'll say from my end, you know, we've been talking about some major differences between the sort of K-12 and college. But one similarity is that, you know, you've mentioned 1910 in the last hundred years, there hasn't been a ton of disruption in the model. There hasn't been a ton of major new entrants, certainly on the on the college side. And what you guys are doing in K-12 and college and we're all doing is elevating the ambition of what's possible in education. the last few years and decade plus. So I'm inspired to be part of your respective journeys. And yeah, thank you. Well, kids are awesome. They can do way more than all of us expect. And I believe that coming out of yours, you're going to just raise that to the next level. Proud to do this with y'all. Yeah, it's great to end up. Thank you. Thanks for listening to this episode of the A16Z podcast. If you liked this episode, be sure to like, comment, subscribe, leave us a rating or review, For more episodes, go to YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify. Follow us on X at A16Z and subscribe to our Substack at a16z.substack.com. Thanks again for listening, and I'll see you in the next episode. A16Z and its affiliates may also maintain investments in the companies discussed in this podcast. For more details, including a link to our investments, please see a16z.com forward slash disclosures. Bye.