Harvard says AI tutors are better than Harvard professors. The students who used an AI tutor in a Harvard physics class (instead of the professor’s teaching) learned more than 2X as much. The best part? They did it in less time and were more motivated and engaged.

According to nationwide MAP testing, the average high school student in the United States learns… nothing. 👇

I have a perfect, 1600 SAT score. I also haven't had a teacher since the 4th grade. For the last 8 years, I've learned exclusively through online, adaptive apps. Education is changing. Follow me to learn how.

What if you could put your kid in Y Combinator? Y Combinator, the legendary startup incubator, has allowed thousands of founders to change not only their lives, but the world as a whole. What if there was a school that could do the same for your child? I propose that we create a high school modeled after Y Combinator. I’d call the project Y-School, and here is how I would design it using Y Combinator’s ideals: 01. Olympic-level Projects (the Billion-dollar Businesses) Students would come to Y-School to spend four years building an Olympic-level project. I love the term Olympic-level simply because Olympic means “best in the world,” not just "good for your age." High school students can be the best in the world at something. The Y-School program will help them achieve it. 02. Passion and Purpose (the Company Mission Statement) Most 13 and 14-year-olds don't have a passion and purpose. The first stage of the Y-School program would be to help kids find what they really love to do, what they're willing to work hard at, and what helps bring purpose to their lives. 03. Become an Expert (the Industry Knowledge of Great Founders) 13 and 14-year-olds are not experts in their area of interest. But to accomplish their goals, they need to be. They need to become the world's experts in their field so they can have new, innovative ideas and be taken seriously by other experts. There are two sets of tasks that help a student become an expert. They are: • Building a Second Brain The first thing students will start building is their Second Brain (thanks @fortelabs!). For thirty minutes per day, they’ll research their field and compile their learnings. • Finding Your Spiky POV and Personal Monopoly As a student builds their Second Brain, it allows them to define and develop their Spiky POV and Personal Monopoly (one of my favorite concepts from David). 04. Build an Audience (the First Customers) You can't run fast in your backyard and call yourself an Olympian. You need to do it in front of fifty million people. We’ll divide this into two parts: • Build an audience of experts Twitter is the best platform for this, because no matter what the domain, the experts hang out on Twitter. Spending just fifteen minutes a day interacting with a highly curated Twitter list helps keep us at the forefront of our fields. • Build an audience of customers The second audience teens need to reach is their customers – and the best place to reach them can vary depending on the project. Building an audience allows teens to continually refine their ideas and thoughts, because they’re working out loud and getting feedback. By nature, teens think they know everything. Having to build an audience shows teens where their ideas are strong, and where they're nonsensical. 04. Build in Public (the Public Launches) As you become an expert and build an audience, you’re also able to build in public. Unlike Y Combinator, where participants can start coding up their app on day one, 13- and 14-year-olds don't have the skills. So while they’re becoming an expert and building an audience, they also need to develop their skills, whether that’s learning to program a video game, doing the basics of a movie shoot, or writing the fundraising pitch for a bike park. And there is no better way to get better than to publish their work for feedback. Successful adults are often willing to "overinvest" in ambitious teens, and our program relies on that. 05. Monetize While all Y Combinator projects are meant to be businesses, that's not true of Y-School projects. My first thought when I thought of Y-School was that most kids in school don't want to build a business. What about them? Well, the skills mentioned above are useful for anyone. But for those who are interested in building a business, you will be surprised at how motivating making money is. Why Y-School will be better than a standard school Kids on AP tracks spend a seemingly infinite number of hours – both at school and after school – on academics, and they don't have the time to do what they love. With the 2 Hour Learning revolution, which uses AI to compress the time that is required for kids to learn, kids can spend their afternoons working on ambitious projects, which is so much more fulfilling than sitting in a classroom. Parents agonize that teens waste their days scrolling TikTok and playing video games. We have the power to change that – to show kids how to stop wasting their high school years. Let’s help them explore, discover, and deeply engage in things they love. If you are interested in helping build this program, please reach out. If you think your child would be interested in this, join us at Alpha High. Links to the mentioned concepts are in my newsletter. Link in my bio.

Half of our graduating seniors score the EXACT same on standardized tests as the highest-performing 3rd graders. Kids are literally wasting nine years of their lives.

For all of my new followers, this is my philosophy: Our school system is outdated. Kids aren’t learning and they’re wildly unprepared for this changing world. This account exists to help parents discover a better way to educate their kids.

The worst thing you can do to your Kindergartener is…put them in Kindergarten. Our 100-year-old education system will dramatically curb your kid’s potential. But, there's another option. This account exists to help parents discover a better way to educate their kids.

We spend THIRTEEN years teaching kids K-12 content when it can be done in FOUR. Here’s the data that proves it:

It's every high schooler's dream to get a perfect SAT score. Only ~0.07% of students actually achieve this goal. When I set a 1600 as my goal, all of my friends thought I was just setting myself up for disappointment. But I worked towards it. Every day. Today, I got a 1600.

Is your child a “STEM kid”? Do they excel in math but dread their English classes? If this sounds familiar, I have an opportunity for you. I created a course specifically for your child titled Equation-Based Writing. This course uses the concepts your kid loves – logic, equations, and formulas – to teach them how to write. They’ll never have to worry about writing an essay again. Check out the website to sign up: equationbasedwriting.com/

When I was 10 years old, my parents pulled me out of school. The next week, they took me to my "new school" – when we pulled up, I was shocked. The "school building" was literally the garage of someone's house. Little did I know, I was part of the biggest experiment in K-12 education. The school had 20 kids, but made some huge promises. Kids would score in the 90th percentile on academics with just 2 hours a day of learning. They would spend the rest of the day learning critical life skills like public speaking and receiving feedback. The kicker was that kids would be able to do all of this without a single teacher. Seven years later, I'm still at the same school – though it's no longer in a garage. During that time, I received a perfect score on the SAT and consistently scored in the 99th percentile academically nationwide. The education system, with all of its flaws, doesn't have to stay the same. I want to teach your kid how they can follow this new model, regardless of the school they currently go to. Subscribe to my newsletter. Link in my bio.

Kids can learn all academic content in 2 hours every day. We have the data to back it up.

For all of my new followers, this is my philosophy: Our school system is outdated. Kids aren’t learning and they’re wildly unprepared for this changing world. This account exists to help parents discover a better way to educate their kids.

If you read George Orwell’s essay, Politics and the English Language, your writing will improve more than it did in 12 years of English class. [THREAD]

You're wasting your kid's time by sending them to school. For over 40 years, educational experts have proven that kids only need to spend 2 hours/day on academics to master every subject. So why do schools force kids to sit through 6+ hours/day? It's because 2 Hour Learning requires schooling methods that aren’t compatible with the “teacher in front of a classroom” model, so no one is brave enough to implement them. In this week's Substack newsletter, I dive into how hundreds of students are already using 2 Hour Learning – and how your kid can too. Link in my bio.

Kids can learn all academic content in 2 hours every day. And we’ve known how for decades. In the 1960s, Benjamin Bloom had a series of amazing breakthroughs in understanding how kids learn–and how to help them learn faster. But his methods were impossible to implement in a traditional classroom, so they’ve been ignored. Technology is just starting to catch up–which means Bloom's ideas are becoming relevant again. Because we can finally implement them, we can radically change how kids learn. Let’s break them down: Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning is a system that classifies learning objectives into increasing levels of complexity. A basic remembering of facts -> an advanced comprehension and evaluation of a concept -> an ability to form new thoughts and insights around a topic. Most schools keep kids in the first two levels–never letting them reach the higher levels of understanding necessary to truly master a topic. Think of how much human potential is being wasted by never teaching kids how to evaluate and create. Mastery Learning is the idea that students should achieve mastery of a concept before moving on to the next one. Today’s school system moves kids through all of the content at the same pace. The kid that gets a 70% on the test will move on to the next topic at the same time as the kid that gets a 95%. The first kid clearly doesn’t understand the concept, and so the next, more complex concept will still not make sense. Bloom’s paper on Mastery Learning posed a really important question: why are we setting our students up for failure by moving them through content at the same pace when we should be prioritizing true understanding and mastery? Bloom’s Two-Sigma Problem summarizes Bloom’s findings: the average student who was tutored by using Mastery Learning techniques performed two standard deviations (A LOT) better than students who were taught in a classroom setting. 60 years ago, it would have been impossible to give every single student a personalized tutor who creates custom content to ensure mastery over all concepts. Today, we have a solution: 2 Hour Learning. With 2 Hour Learning, kids use online apps powered by AI and backed by learning science to learn academic content in 2 hours every day. 2 Hour Learning allows each student to learn at their own pace: Students who quickly master the material can move forward. Students who are confused won’t move forward until they learn the foundations they’re missing. Online apps give each student their own personalized tutor. Now that apps exist, teens can take advantage of the data and science behind how to learn better and faster and can incorporate those learning science techniques into their normal studying habits. Check out my newsletter on 2 Hour Learning for more information. Link in my bio.

For over 40 years, educational experts have proven that kids only need to spend 2 hours/day on academics to crush every subject. But to do this, you have to use schooling methods that aren’t compatible with the “teacher in front of a classroom” model, so no one implements them.

Y Combinator, the legendary startup incubator, has given thousands of founders the opportunity to change not only their lives, but the world as a whole. What if there was a school that could do the same for your child? I propose that we create a high school modeled after Y Combinator, made possible by taking advantage of “2 Hour Learning,” a new educational concept that uses AI-powered adaptive learning apps to allow kids to fit academics into just two hours a day. I’d call the project Y-School, and here is how I would design it using Y Combinator’s ideals: 01. Olympic-level Projects (the Billion-dollar Businesses) Students would come to Y-School to spend four years of afternoons (and, of course, nights and weekends) building an Olympic-level project. I love the term Olympic-level simply because Olympic means “best in the world,” not just "good for your age." Most adults–and parents–consistently lower their child's expectations to keep the kid from failing. But, the most important thing a teacher can do is help kids raise their standards (love how @tylercowen frames this). High school students can be the best in the world at something. The Y-School program will help them achieve it. 02. Passion and Purpose (the Company Mission Statement) Most 13 and 14-year-olds don't have a passion and purpose. The first stage of the Y-School program would be to help kids find this. Some kids would come to Y-School knowing all of this and would be off to the races, while others might change their Olympic-level project every few months. Parents should be relaxed about their child’s changing projects. What could be better than spending four years with your child experimenting to find their life's purpose? A great exercise for finding your passion is the Ikigai framework. I've seen teens at Alpha work through and think about the four items (what they love, what they’re good at, what the world needs, and what they can make money from) for the first time. The world makes so much more sense when they think about things through this framework. While this structure is mostly built for adults, I've seen many kids work through it and have true "a-ha" moments. 03. Become an Expert (the Industry Knowledge of Great Founders) 13 and 14-year-olds are not experts in their area of interest. But to accomplish their goals, they need to be. They need to become the world's experts in their field so they can have new, innovative ideas and be taken seriously. They have four years to build this knowledge, so there's plenty of time. There are two sets of tasks that help a student become an expert. They are: • Building a Second Brain The first thing students will start building is their Second Brain (thanks @fortelabs!). For thirty minutes per day, they’ll research and compile their learnings. Yes, everything you need to know is available on the internet or in an AI, but the key is to compile a Second Brain repository of your own expertise. Our “test to pass” for a student’s Second Brain: when loaded into a GPT, it gives better answers than ChatGPT does alone (credit, of course, to @sama!). • Finding Your Spiky POV and Personal Monopoly As a student builds their Second Brain, it allows them to define their Spiky POV and Personal Monopoly (one of my favorite concepts from @david_perell). The other key thing these exercises do is push kids away from the old-school path and towards the frontier of knowledge (thanks to @paulg himself for this one). 04. Build an Audience (the First Customers) Most teens fall into one of two camps: creator or distributor. Creators are kids who want to write books, build a video game, score a musical, or create a movie. Distributors are kids who want to post six times a day on TikTok, build Roblox clans, or give speeches–networkers extraordinaire. Creators are interested in the artistic side of a project, while distributors are interested in getting content in front of people. Teen creators almost never want to show their work to anyone. When I was a freshman, I was super happy to just write my stories and save the file to my Google Drive. Distributors, on the other hand, shy away from the deep work required to become a true expert. When my sister was a freshman, I always felt I had to double-check the facts she was claiming in her speeches. But to be Olympic-level, you must be both. As one of my guides at Alpha constantly tells us, you can't run fast in your backyard and call yourself an Olympian. And this leads to our next exercise, which is to build an audience. We’ll divide this into two parts: • Build an audience of experts Twitter is the best platform for this, because no matter what the domain, the experts hang out on Twitter. Spending just fifteen minutes a day interacting with a highly curated Twitter list helps keep us at the forefront of our fields. • Build an audience of customers The second audience teens need to reach is their customers – and the best place to reach them can vary depending on the project. Kids targeting other teens would focus on TikTok, while I go after parents with my Substack. Sometimes audiences aren’t even on the internet. I have a classmate who built a bike park from his in-person network of mountain bikers. Building an audience allows teens to continually refine their ideas because they’re getting feedback. By nature, teens think they know everything. Having to build an audience shows teens where their ideas are strong, and where they're nonsensical. 04. Build in Public (the Public Launches) As you become an expert and build an audience, you’re also able to build in public. Unlike Y Combinator, where participants can start coding up their app on day one, 13- and 14-year-olds don't have the skills. So while they’re becoming an expert and building an audience, they also need to develop their skills, whether that’s learning to program a video game, doing the basics of a movie shoot, or writing the fundraising pitch for a bike park. And there is no better way to get better than to publish their work for feedback. Successful adults are often willing to "overinvest" in ambitious teens. Grandmasters are willing to help teens build a program to teach a million kids how to play chess. Broadway producers review musical scripts of a group of teens trying to write their first musical. I've been helped by countless (@david_perell, @SahilBloom, @rebelEducator, @Austen, and so many more). Teens will listen to third-party adults. Parents hesitate to criticize their child's work for fear of the impact on their already tenuous relationship. The internet has no such qualms. Real-world expertise is in the real world. It can't be a requirement of being in the classroom. 05. Monetize While all Y Combinator projects are meant to be businesses, that's not true of Y-School projects. My first thought when I thought of Y-School was that many kids in school don't want to build a business. What about them? Well, the skills mentioned above are useful for anyone. My friend @travelingenes is trying to save the world from cancer, not build a business, while @TovarMFriedman is trying to become the youngest congressperson in the US. But for those who are interested in building a business, you'll be surprised at how motivating making money is. Why Y-School will be better than a standard school Kids on AP tracks spend a seemingly infinite number of hours – both at school and after school – on academics, and they don't have the time to do what they love. With the 2 Hour Learning revolution, having kids spend their afternoons working on ambitious projects is so much more fulfilling than sitting in a classroom. Parents agonize that teens waste their days scrolling TikTok and playing video games. We have the power to change that – to show kids how to stop wasting their high school years. Let’s help them explore, discover, and deeply engage in things they love. If you are interested in helping build this program, please reach out. If you think your child would be interested in this, join us at Alpha High. Links to the mentioned concepts are in my newsletter. Link in my bio.

When I was 10 years old, my parents pulled me out of school. The next week, they took me to my "new school" – when we pulled up, I was shocked. The "school building" was literally the garage of someone's house. Little did I know, I was part of the biggest experiment in K-12 education. The school had 20 kids, but made some huge promises. Kids would score in the 90th percentile on academics with just 2 hours a day of learning. They would spend the rest of the day learning critical life skills like public speaking and receiving feedback. The kicker was that kids would be able to do all of this without a single teacher. Seven years later, I'm still at the same school – though it's no longer in a garage. During that time, I received a perfect score on the SAT and consistently scored in the 99th percentile academically nationwide. The education system, with all of its flaws, doesn't have to stay the same. I want to teach your kid how they can follow this new model, regardless of the school they currently go to. Subscribe to my newsletter. Link in my bio.

Kids can do 50% of an ENTIRE GRADE LEVEL in TWO WEEKS. The best educators in America think the key to increased learning efficiency is to make the content super engaging, but that’s totally wrong. It’s WAY easier than that.

Sahil Bloom is perhaps Twitter's most sophisticated thinker. But, his life-changing ideas don't reach teens. So, I transformed Sahil’s thread on razors into 4 rules every teenager should live by:

"Fast learners" don't exist. No one child learns faster than their peers – is naturally able to move through material quicker. It just depends on their "starting point" – their previous knowledge bank. Every child is capable of excelling, we just have to give them the chance.

Telling kids “don’t read ahead” belongs in the dustbin of outdated educational practices. What a detrimental thing to teach children–that they should reign in their curiosity, and not run with it.

We've known that AI tutors help students learn more in less time for years. I write about how every week. Subscribe to my newsletter (link in my bio).

I'm 18 years old and I graduated high school with a 1600 SAT score, thousands of X & Substack followers, and acceptances to 2 of the top 10 universities in the world (Stanford and UCL). And I haven't had a teacher since the 4th grade. Here is how I did it: (7 minutes to transform the way you think about education forever.) 1. I took accountability for my education I knew from the beginning I was entering a weird, new education space. I was embarking on a journey that no one else had been on before. (Literally – I’m in the first true graduating class of my school @AlphaSchoolATX) But it wouldn’t work if I didn’t take accountability for what I was doing. Without a teacher telling me what to do every day, I knew I wouldn't learn anything if I didn’t take accountability for what I was doing. I took the initiative. I made the decision to do this. I couldn’t blame other people or circumstances for anything that went wrong. It was my job to do whatever I needed to do to graduate high school. My education truly became my own. My wins were mine, but so were my losses. And this just made me work harder and harder to ensure those wins – because I knew they were in my control. By far and away, this was the biggest game-changer for me. This paradigm will make a difference for every high schooler, even if they're in a traditional school. Talk to your kid about why they want to do well in school – what their wins now will give them later on in life. Let them make decisions about their education and support their dreams. And if it’s not intuitive for them (because let’s be real, most schools don’t teach this), show your kid how to take control of their education. 2. I learned how to learn If you don’t have a teacher, you need to learn how to learn on your own. When I started at Alpha, I had to pick this skill up fast. I learned about learning science – spaced repetition, retrieval practice, interleaving, and so much more – to make studying more efficient. I put together learning plans to ensure I could become an expert in whatever topic I needed. And most importantly, I learned how I personally learn best – through explaining a concept to someone else. After I got the basic idea down through videos, articles, or practice questions, I would explain that concept either to one of my friends or to my computer (yes, I probably looked a little crazy). Through the explanation process, I was able to fully cement any idea in my brain. That’s how I learn best. But every kid is different – and you, as a parent, should help your kid identify both how to learn (broadly) and what method of learning works best for them. A lot of it comes from exposure to different ideas. Tell them about different learning strategies and talk with them about which they like most. Show them how to use ChatGPT (with its new -4o update) and YouTube to learn concepts on their own – and how to find different books, articles, and documentaries about specific topics to expand their knowledge. And, of course, encourage them to practice – give them fun topics (like the Six Flags amusement park or Lululemon) and have them learn everything there is to know about it. They’ll be experts in no time. 3. I compiled resources before starting Before every school year, I planned out the courses I was going to take. For example, in my junior year I did AP Statistics, AP Physics 1, AP Literature, US History, and German 3. Before I even stepped foot in my school building, I created study guides for every single course and curated all of the resources I was going to use to ensure my success. Not only did this pre-planning help me become familiarized with the material before I started really studying, but it also allowed me to know exactly what to do if I was ever stuck in a course. Whether it was Fiveable or Heimler’s History or AP Daily or Albert or IXL or Khan Academy, I had everything I needed to succeed. 4. I used online apps I didn’t need teachers, because I used online, adaptive, AI-powered apps to learn instead. These apps allowed me to have a completely personalized education and learn at my own pace. If I was stuck on a topic, I would be able to spend more time mastering it, and if I already knew the concept I was able to skip ahead. Because of this, I finished Calculus in my sophomore year of high school and started college English classes my senior year. In science and history, which were my weaker points,  I stayed pretty “on-track”  – because the apps didn’t rush me past content I didn’t understand. Here are the apps I used the most: Math IXL (ixl.com/) Knewton Alta (wiley.com/en-us/education/al…) Khan Academy (khanacademy.org/) Outlier (outlier.org/) English IXL (ixl.com/) eGUMPP (egumpp.com/) Outlier (outlier.org/) Albert (albert.io/) History Albert (albert.io/) Fiveable (fiveable.me/) College Board questions & videos (collegeboard.org/) Science Knewton Alta (wiley.com/en-us/education/al…) Khan Academy (khanacademy.org/) Fiveable (fiveable.me/) 5. I believed in myself, even when I failed When I was in seventh grade, I failed my exams. I was three years into this new way of learning and I took the state standardized tests for the first time since and I failed them. I could’ve given up – blamed the system and moved on. But instead, I took accountability for what I didn’t know. I got better and worked harder to pass these tests. I knew I could do it – I just needed to adjust a few things. So, I started to use more learning science techniques to improve my study sessions (I used Pomodoros, explained the concepts to a friend, and did practice questions right after learning). And pretty soon I started crushing it. My belief in myself and my unwavering commitment allowed me to succeed. There were so many times I could’ve given up, but pushing through led me to where I am today. Parents: your job is to support your kid unconditionally, and show them you believe in them. If they aren’t doing well in a class, don’t just get upset at them – problem-solve instead. Work together to find ways to improve. And always tell them they can improve. Your encouragement will help them believe it. 6. I didn’t complain (I used the Serenity Prayer) You gain nothing by complaining. Nothing. You just make yourself feel terrible and angry. Because Alpha High is still growing and changing every day, there were things that didn’t work – whether it was a glitch in one of the new apps, or poor organization during an outing. But I learned that complaining didn’t fix anything. The glitch wasn’t gone any faster and the outing didn’t magically become more fun. I just got upset and annoyed the people around me. So I started to use the Serenity Prayer to help: God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Tell your kid to say this a few times if they get annoyed. It'll help them clear their mind. 7. I put in the work There’s no way around it: high school is a lot of work. But that’s what makes it valuable. Yes, I stayed at school from 8:30am to 8:30pm day after day; I struggled for hours to understand a Calculus topic (and I still don’t really understand how to solve Taylor Series problems…); I lost sleep and had anxiety and worked my brain too hard. I did hours and hours of schoolwork while my sister was hanging out with her friends. It was hard. I struggled. But I wouldn’t have the achievements I do today without that work. All of those hours were worth it. And that’s just something your kid will have to accept. Yes, it will be a lot of work, but it will be worth it – the lessons they learn will be endlessly valuable. 8. I problem-solved my way through my failures If I ever felt like I failed – if my thoughts were running wild and I had too much energy in my chest and my hands were shaking – I would let myself cry for a little bit, and then I would pick myself back up and start problem-solving. First, I would write down every issue or failure I had. For example, I might… • Have a headache • Have failed my practice test on electromagnetism in Physics 2 • Not know what to post on Twitter • Feel left out because my friends didn’t invite me to hang out with them • Feel exhausted and sad After I had my list, I’d write down a direct solution for every problem: • Take Advil and use an ice pack • Make a study plan for tomorrow (watch a video and do practice questions for one hour) • Ask ChatGPT or get inspiration from my friend Grace @travelingenes • Practice radical acceptance – unless I want to start prioritizing hanging out with my friends over studying, I just have to accept that they aren’t going to invite me out as often • Take a shower and then take a nap Obviously, that wouldn’t have been a good day, even with my problem-solving, but I at least set myself up to have a better day tomorrow. 9. I raised my standards You can’t do great things by doing what everyone else is doing. If you want to get into a school with a 3% acceptance rate, you have to be doing what the top 3% is doing. It might seem harsh, but you have to strive to be better and better. If I couldn’t get at least 90% of my practice questions correct before a test, I would keep doing them until I could. If one of my Twitter posts didn’t do well, I would spend twice as much time the next day making a better one. You can’t settle. It’s like that story of Jay Williams seeing Kobe Bryant practicing before their game and Kobe practicing for so much longer than Jay and when Jay asked the reason, Kobe said that “I just wanted you to know that no matter how hard you work, I’m willing to work harder than you.” Work harder. Raise the bar. Achieve your dreams.

I'm 17 years old & I started writing online 2 years ago. And I met Sam Altman yesterday. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine I could have these opportunities and this network because of my writing. How far I've come. @sama @david_perell

Experts proved that kids only need to spend 2 hours/day on academics to crush every subject... And they proved this OVER 40 YEARS AGO. But to do it, you need schooling methods that aren’t compatible with the “teacher in front of a classroom” model, so no school uses them.

Why does this work? Personalization. AI has the potential to create personalized content for every student. According to lecturer Kelly Miller, “students who have a very strong background in the material may be less engaged, and they’re sometimes bored, and students who don’t have the background sometimes struggle to keep up.” The other lecturer, Gregory Kestin, stated that “there was no correlation between the amount of time spent and performance on the test of learning, indicating that personalized pacing was a key driver of success”.

Our schools are broken. We have so much new technology available that can radically change education, but we're not using it. Here's what school should look like – and we have everything we need to make it happen today:

Here are the specific results of the study: The students who used AI learned twice as much as those who had even an "active learning" lecture. A majority of students using AI spent less time learning the topics.

Sahil Bloom is perhaps Twitter's most sophisticated thinker. But, his life-changing ideas don't reach teens. So, I transformed Sahil’s thread on razors into 4 rules every teenager should live by: Let's be honest: High schoolers are known to be poor decision-makers. They, more than anyone, need these razors (tools to simplify decision-making) to help them make good choices. 1. The Feynman Razor: When you're studying for a test, explain it like you’re telling a five-year-old. If you can't define terms or describe processes without complexity and jargon, you probably don't really understand it. 2. The Writing Knife Block: To test yourself or establish what you know, write down everything you know about that concept. Mark down when you get stuck and identify the gaps in your knowledge. Fill in the gaps, then try again. "Writing is the ultimate tool to sharpen thinking--use it as a "knife block" for life." –Sahil Bloom 3. The Opinion Razor: Unless you fully understand the other side (of a breakup, an argument, etc.), you haven't earned an opinion on it. Speaking on something you don't know can only cause harm. 4. Hanlon's Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity." It is a crucial component of happiness in high school to recognize that not everyone is out to get you. Rude comments, forgetting important dates, not understanding your feelings, and so much more can–sometimes– just be attributed to the stupidity and ignorance of high schoolers. Knowing these razors can completely change any high schooler's life: - Grades (Using Feynman’s Razor to better prepare for tests) - Friendships (Remembering the Opinion Razor and staying out of the drama that doesn’t involve you) - Happiness (Realizing that your friend wasn’t trying to be mean, they were just ignorant) Thanks for reading! If you found this helpful, follow me @AustinScholar to get more threads like this.

You heard that right. We’re graduating kids who know as much math as a 3rd grader. What is our education system doing? Certainly not educating kids.

And not only that, but those 50th percentile 12th graders score the EXACT same as the highest performing 3rd graders.

Wow–this blew up. With reflection, this post doesn't represent me the way I would like. First, it definitely comes across as too boastful, so I want to apologize for that. I never want to be that person. Second, I realize it is not most high schoolers' goal to get a 1600 on the SAT. That was MY goal. Third, this makes me seem one-dimensional, caring only about academics and standardized test scores, which couldn't be further from the truth. I go to a school called Alpha High where we only spend 2-3 hours per day on academics – most of our day is spent on our Masterpieces and developing life skills. Fourth, the reason it was my goal is because I'm trying to show that you only need to spend 2-3 hours a day and still crush it academically. I agree that the old school "giving up your high school years to chase good SAT and AP scores" is terrible.  Fifth, I encourage everyone to read my newsletter (link in my bio), where 80% of the newsletters talk about how my radical school that doesn't have academic teachers allows me to focus on passion projects and developing life skills. Sixth, I'll be submitting this post to my Alpha High guide as an example of the life skill of "receiving feedback in order to get better." 😄 Thanks to everyone for both the support and criticism. I'm learning every day.

I turn 18 today. Here's an incomplete list of everything I did as a "child": • made $30K from my writing • gained 27K followers on X • met Sam Altman, David Perell, Sahil Bloom, Ana Lorena Fabrega, and more • worked at Write of Passage • got into Stanford

These tables clearly show the data from the catastrophe that is our educational system–especially high school. The average (50th percentile) student learns next to nothing in FOUR years of high school. It’s only the high achievers (99th percentile) who see growth.

Your school is lying to you. Your kid gets good grades but isn't learning. Here's how you can help (and it only takes 10 minutes a week):

We’re teaching kids history wrong. History should be a story–an exciting, meaningful account of our past that we can learn from. Not memorizing dates and last names and titles of wars.

The worst thing you can do to your Kindergartener is…put them in Kindergarten. Our 100-year-old education system will dramatically curb your kid’s potential. Here’s how kids can reach the 99th percentile on nationwide tests–all without a teacher 👇:

I just interviewed J.D. Martinez, one of the best hitters in baseball. Here's how he went from being cut by the worst team in baseball to becoming an All-Star:

Going to Stanford convinced me that kids can learn better with AI apps than with teachers. Why? Here are my 3 reasons: 1. Your success in a class should not depend on your teacher

My school doesn't have teachers. We just got our testing results back (NWEA) and the average student learned 2.5x faster than at a standard school. Some of our kids learn at 7.7x. Many jump from 10th percentiles of their grade to 80+ Adaptive, AI-powered apps are the future.

In the 1960s, Benjamin Bloom had a series of amazing breakthroughs in understanding how kids learn–and how to help them learn faster. But his methods were impossible to implement in a traditional classroom, so they’ve been ignored. [THREAD]

When Sahil Bloom published his book, The 5 Types of Wealth, earlier this year, I knew my time had come to yet again become his teenage translation engine :) His book is about designing your dream life, something that could not be more applicable to kids, and teenagers particularly. I mean, that’s literally the entire point of growing up – trying to figure out who you are and what you want out of life. Here are the 5 Types of Wealth and exercises for your kid to incorporate into their life:

This video will change how you think about school. Education doesn't have to look the same way it has for hundreds of years. Kids are capable of so much–just look at the evidence:

Here's what high school SHOULD look like. This is the story of a high schooler who learns academics in only 2 hours per day so he can do something real with his time: "I'm creating the first world-class bike park in Texas and raising $350,000 from investors. I wanted to pursue something entrepreneurial and ambitious, yet something I'm passionate about - mountain biking. And I would consider myself an absolute expert in mountain biking. I spend about 20-30 hours a week mountain biking. It's what I do after school and my social life revolves around it. I've been racing for four years and am insanely interested in trail building. That passion gave birth to the idea for my project. In my Masterpiece so far, I built a $40,000 bike park on one acre of public land with a lot of help. After completing that smaller bike park, I wanted to create something bigger. So then, I raised $358,000 from 22 equity investors. I closed that deal two months ago. Since then, I've had 30 build days, hired 10 full-time builders, and persuaded a real estate investor to purchase a $3 million property for the park. We're planning to open the bike park on November 3rd. I've completed the full project management plan, hired all the employees, and secured both the real estate and equity investors. So, I'd say we're well into the project. About the investors, my motivation kicked in January of this year when I was a junior. First, I made a pitch deck and held Zoom calls with people, asking them to help me refine it. I actually found that many entrepreneurs were willing to help a high school student they'd never met. I then tried to get investors. I attended so many conferences downtown and sent about 400 LinkedIn messages to potential investors who had "mountain bike" in their profiles. I also networked on Twitter. After six months, I secured 22 investors. We're planning to open the park in eight weeks. I can't wait to open the bike park. While securing investors and raising the money was exciting, I'm eager to see the culmination of all this work. Here's some final advice: If you're interested in the entrepreneurial path of raising money, don't think it's impossible. A year ago, I thought it was impossible for a high school student to raise money for a business of this size. But all it takes is creating a pitch deck, reaching out to people, and starting." If you want to hear more stories like this one, subscribe to my Substack newsletter Austin Scholar. Link in my bio.

High schoolers can do anything. My classmates and I just spent 48 hours doing this: • Creating a 4-week online course on how to have a 75% chance at getting into an Ivy League (with speaker scripts, exercises, breakout rooms, etc.) • Making a 30-page Second Brain with all of the best information and experts in the field • Making 100+ marketing videos for TikTok and Instagram • Creating a landing page and email capture system • Writing a book (yes, a full book) to go along with the course • Creating a GPT to calculate admissions chances • Writing a 2-minute pitch for the course How many adults do you know that can do this? Here's the website: 75percentchance.com/

More than ⅔ of students in America can’t read. At least not at grade level. A brief look into our country’s approach to reading instruction shows us why:

ChatGPT: the revolutionary chatbot that gives high schoolers an insanely easy way to cheat–without getting caught. I have no doubt thousands of kids have already turned in A+ papers without writing a single word. So, what does that mean for education? 👇

We live in a world where grades go up... and standardized test scores go down. Good grades don't mean what they used to.

The average graduating 12th grader scores the EXACT same on standardized tests as the highest performing 3rd grader. How does this happen? 👇

I graduated high school on Friday. And it’s been 8 years since I’ve had a teacher. Education is changing – and I’m so proud to be at the forefront.

Imagine you're a teacher to a 6th-grade math class. You’ve got a group of kids who are ahead and know 11th-grade math. AND a group of kids who are behind and know little more past 2nd-grade math. You have no choice but to teach to the middle, so class is pointless for most.

Another incredible part of Harvard’s article is that it stated that “if AI can be used to effectively teach introductory material to students outside of class, this would allow “precious class time” to be spent developing “higher-order skills, such as advanced problem-solving, project-based learning, and group work.”

I haven't had a teacher since fourth grade. I've gotten my entire education from online apps–and I score in the 99th percentile. My spicy take: adaptive apps are the answer to America's education problems.

Schools lie to you. Grades go up... and standardized test scores go down. Good grades don't mean what they used to. Here's a quick way to see how much your kid really knows:

In other words, students can spend class time learning life skills and building a community. This is exactly what school should be about. Kids don't need to waste their childhood sitting in class, listening to lecture after lecture.

Kids need to learn a new set of life skills that aren’t taught in standard school: - Learning to learn (& loving to learn) - Mastery-based mindset - Setting ambitious goals - Giving and receiving feedback - Writing for an audience What else would you add?

Sahil Bloom created a journaling method that radically improved thousands of people's lives. But, this transformative technique doesn't reach teens–who probably need it the most. So, I reframed Sahil's 1-1-1 method into the most impactful journaling habit teenagers could have:

Parents – let your kids play video games. They are THE MOST powerful tool you have to motivate your kid 👇:

Kids need to learn a new set of life skills that aren’t taught in standard school: • Learning to learn • Setting ambitious goals • Giving and receiving feedback • Writing for an audience • How to use AI What else would you add?

The best way to learn school didn't teach you: spaced practice

AI tutors will meet your students where they’re at in a way impossible for teachers and professors of large classes (like Harvard’s physics class) to do.

We weren’t born understanding these complex concepts, we didn’t have a life-changing teacher, and we don’t spend 5X the amount of time studying. Instead, we use online, adaptive learning software. These online apps allow each student to learn at their own pace.

Kids need to learn a new set of life skills that aren’t taught in standard school: - Taking ownership of their education - Learning to learn - Mastery-based mindset - Daily habits - Setting ambitious goals - Mindfulness What else would you add?

Our outdated education system is raising kids that: • hate learning • have had their creativity drilled out of them • haven't developed problem-solving skills This bodes poorly for our world. We must fix this broken system–or the consequences will be dire.

Thousands of high schoolers dream of going to Stanford. I’m no different. Less than 4% of applicants actually achieve this goal. But I worked towards it. Every day. And it paid off.

This 7th-grade teacher says his students are performing at a 4th-grade level. And schools aren't doing anything about it. They keep moving kids along. There are hundreds of stitches of this video of teachers saying they're in the same situation. Schools are failing students.

“Who questions much, shall learn much, and retain much.”– Francis Bacon Encourage kids to ask "why." Don't stifle their curiosity.

For those who are able to quickly understand the material, the apps allow the students to advance to a level that challenges them, and for those who are confused, the apps allow the students to be placed at a level to learn the foundations they are missing.

The cheat sheet to the future of education. For those who don’t have the time to read 80+ newsletters, here’s Austin’s Essentials Playlist: On academics • 2 Hour Learning: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • Austin’s App Analysis (the adaptive apps I’ve used and how to pick one for your kid): austinscholar.substack.com/p… • Do educational apps really work?: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • How generative AI will transform education: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • Why (and how) your kid should use AI to study: austinscholar.substack.com/p… On connecting with your kid • The three equations you need to connect with your kid: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • How to intentionally build a relationship with your kid, even if they’re angry at you: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • How an online test can save your family’s internal communication: austinscholar.substack.com/p… On life skills • What is a Masterpiece? And why should your kid have one?: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • How to help your kid get better at receiving feedback: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • How Jayson Tatum used YouTube to become one of the NBA’s greatest players: austinscholar.substack.com/p… On mental health • How texting saved my relationship with my parents: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • The science of cognitive distortions (or twisty thoughts): austinscholar.substack.com/p… • Five logical reasons mental health needs to come first: austinscholar.substack.com/p… • Even if it’s not your kid: austinscholar.substack.com/p…

We’re teaching kids history wrong. History should be a story–an exciting, meaningful account of our past that we can learn from. Not memorizing dates and last names and titles of wars. Last week, I wrote a newsletter on how we can fix history classes 👇

Sahil Bloom created a journaling method that radically improved thousands of people's lives. But, this transformative technique doesn't reach teens–who probably need it the most. So, I reframed Sahil's 1-1-1 method into the most impactful journaling habit teenagers could have: Sahil's 1-1-1 Method (Austin's Version) Every single night, before you go to sleep, open up your journal and write down three simple points... • 1 thing that made you proud It feels really good to have one thing every day that you're proud of doing. It can be something like "I got a good grade on my quiz" or "I got out of bed on time." The tiny wins compound. Stack them up! • 1 thing that made you stressed Get the stress out of your mind and body and onto paper. Abstract stress–stress without a clear name–can build up quickly. Define the stress and you might find it doesn't seem as scary. • 1 thing that made you happy Appreciate the things every day that make you smile. It could be a conversation with a friend or a new food. All these little things add value to your life. When you're having a bad day, look back at what makes you happy and try to do them again. It takes five minutes. The 1-1-1 Method works because of its simplicity. By celebrating your successes, remembering points of happiness, and letting out stress, this is an easy way to start building a journaling habit that will improve your mental health in 2023. I can't explain how valuable journaling is to me–even if I just write 2 sentences a day. I've been journaling since 2020, and because I journal, I can see how I've grown. 2 years ago, I wasn't in the best mental state and wasn't happy with life. It showed in my journal entries. Any time I need encouragement, I can compare my "today from two years ago" and be proud of how much I've changed and improved my life. High school contains a ton of experiences that can change someone's life. Teenagers are constantly changing as they try to figure out who they are, and it is so rewarding to see the transformations. Thanks for reading! If you found this helpful, follow me @AustinScholar to get more threads like this. Check out @SahilBloom ’s original thread here: nitter.app/SahilBloom/status/1609…

They can learn all academic content in just two hours per day and will have the rest of the day freed up to learn valuable life skills like grit or public speaking, all the while forming life-long, supportive relationships with the people around them.

My school, Alpha High, gave all the students MAP tests this week-and I scored off the charts (in a good way). It’s not just me, either. My best friends all soar past the 99th percentile numbers in all four subjects.

130 MILLION adults in the US can't read at a 6th-grade level. Why aren't schools doing their jobs? Why are the majority of students learning nothing? Why are schools failing your kids?

And because of the adaptivity, students can move through the content at a much faster pace because they aren’t waiting for another student to catch up, allowing them to improve at insane rates.

This is the future of education. EVERY STUDENT can have their own personal tutor to learn anything. ChatGPT-4o will change the world.

Kids aren’t learning ANYTHING in school. Once they get to 8th grade, they’re learning less than 15% of a grade level across all subjects per year. They are wasting away their childhoods.

For all of my new followers, this is who I am: I got a 1600 SAT score & am a freshman at Stanford. But... I haven’t had a teacher since the fourth grade. Our education system is failing students. Kids are falling behind in their academics – over 50% of students can’t pass their state exams. But there’s a new, better way: online, AI-powered apps that help kids learn their academics in just 2 hours each day. I'm Austin Scholar and I am transforming the way parents view education through my newsletter that influences over 10,000 parents. If you want to learn more about online apps and join this education revolution, follow @AustinScholar and subscribe to the Austin Scholar newsletter (link in bio).

Most parents know traditional school holds gifted students back, but they don't realize how much. But gt school just opened, and the results are insane. When your kid isn't held back, they learn 5x as much as a traditional school. Don't let school destroy kids' potential.

Traditional school doesn't teach kids how to be successful. So many kids graduate feeling lost, with no clue what comes next. School should prepare kids for the real world, not just teach them how to pass tests.

I'm seventeen years old. Never did I imagine 148,000 people would read my writing. Thanks to all of y'all who helped me get this far. I'm truly blessed 🙏

First off, what is MAP testing? MAP is the nationwide Measures of Academic Progress test & it assesses K-12 students’ achievement and growth in academic content.

I'm 18 years old. I've written 200K+ words on our failing education system. Here are 10 pieces of advice from my very first articles: 1. When kids learn through online, AI-powered apps (takes 2 hours/day), they can spend their afternoons learning life skills.

“Mathematicians don’t come up with the proofs first. First comes intuition. Rigor comes later. This essential role of intuition and imagination is left out of high school geometry courses, but it is essential to all creative mathematics.” -Steven Strogatz, Infinite Powers

Through online learning, it’s possible for anyone to reach the 99th percentile and grow at least twice as fast as they would in the education system. All you have to do is try.

Great teachers are the key to a great school. AI tutors just replaced all the teachers at my school. And school is better than ever. Our school is so fantastic because of the supportive adults guiding us through our day (we call them “Guides”). They don’t teach academics (they don’t have to–we have apps for that), but they sure are teaching us life skills and helping us on the journey of growing up. It hasn’t always been possible for teachers to be in a “Guide” role. It’s been necessary for students to learn their core curriculum from a teacher standing in front of a classroom, grading their paper worksheets and handwritten essays, simply because there was no alternative. But now, in this new age of AI, technology can take over the boring job of teaching academic content, giving teachers the time to form genuine bonds with their students–bonds that allow them to provide motivational and emotional support to every student. Instead of nagging kids to complete assignments, they can connect with the students on a deeper level, so they can be allies instead of enemies, since the apps can take care of the boring academic stuff. Because let’s be real: teachers didn’t become teachers to grade exams and create lesson plans. They did it to transform kids’ lives. AI allows them to spend 100% of their time doing just that. They can play the motivational and emotional support role they’ve always dreamed of being. If you want to learn more, check out my newsletter. Link in my bio.

I’m 18 years old and going to Stanford next year. Here is my short Anti-To-Do List (things I avoided doing) to get there: (cc: @SahilBloom) 1. Do not give excuses Take accountability. Excuses don’t get you anywhere. Assess the situation, decide next steps, and move on.

I got to meet one of my idols today: @SahilBloom. We had an incredible conversation about the value in being excited about and dedicated to something – and how this should be a central part of a child's education. Sahil – so thankful to be able to learn from you today.

Most educators will tell you that there are two things you need to educate a kid: 1. A motivated learner (by far the most important) 2. Lessons at the correct level of difficulty for said student Schools fail at both of these things.

90% of the time a kid spends with their parents is over by the time they leave for college. Parents: don't waste it.

New data from @AlphaSchoolATX shows that to master ALL of K-12 math, it only takes the AVERAGE kid (not even the SMARTEST kid) 871 hours – compared to the 2340+ hours spent in traditional school (1 hour per day at 180 days per school year).

Kids grow up believing they can become world-famous pop stars, millionaire doctors, and magical fairy princesses. When they hit college, they're told to aim for a stable 9-5. Why do we teach kids to stop dreaming?

This post received lots of negative reactions. Here are my thoughts: There are learning speed differences between kids, but using AI tutoring apps dramatically reduces those differences – and eliminates learning speed as a major component of K-8 learning. The paper's main point is that putting kids into the correct material is dramatically more important than innate learning speed in how much kids learn. I agree with this. My long-time classmates and I looked at our data (in IXL and Khan Academy) going back a few years and found this as a representative example: Two 6th-grade students' time to complete the same lesson: Student A - 14 minutes & Student B - 70 minutes. Huge difference. The problem, though, with the 70-minute student isn't learning speed. It's that they're in material that's too advanced. When that student is put into 4th-grade material, the time to complete those lessons drops to 15-18 minutes. Not a huge difference in learning speed. But 4th-grade material is too easy for a 6th-grade student, right? Well, after the student went back and learned 4th and 5th-grade material and is back in 6th-grade material, the average time to complete a 6th-grade lesson is <20 minutes. Of course, this is still different than Student A, but in the ballpark of the paper's claims. If Student A takes 14 minutes to learn their daily lesson and Student B takes 20 minutes, there really is no practical impact on how much they can learn in their K-8 years. PS - Our aggregate data is higher than the 50% of the paper, but my classmates' view is that most of the difference is motivational, not capability (e.g. we ran a contest with prizes, and kids' time to complete lessons went down by 50%).

Kids have two choices: • Memorize for a test (pointless) • Learn for themselves (valuable) Guess which one they're taught how to do? Something needs to change.

I'm turning 17 tomorrow. I'm so proud of what I've done as a 16-year-old: • wrote over 50 editions of my newsletter • got an A+ in Calculus BC • started working with @david_perell • gotten 4K Twitter followers • had the best relationship with my parents and sister yet

Here is the newsletter I wrote about it: austinscholar.substack.com/p… And here is the official study: researchsquare.com/article/r…

Teenagers need to sleep more. Schools are actively sabotaging them by making their mental health worse, decreasing their ability to focus and remember things, and so much more because of their too-early start times. Teenagers' circadian rhythm is different – we fall asleep later and wake up later. Schools should support that in order to help us succeed, not work against it.

This kind of education is possible, and studies like this one will make it accessible to more and more students who need it. Check out my newsletter where I talk about how to use AI to superpower your education every week: austinscholar.substack.com/