Alpha School, a for-profit private institution, is expanding its artificial-intelligence-driven educational model to Tulsa, Oklahoma. The new campus, located at 109 N.
Detroit, will serve 25 to 30 families and cover kindergarten through eighth grade.
The expansion comes amid academic research highlighting the complex reality of AI-centric learning.
While computer-assisted instruction offers personalized pacing, AI tutors do not inherently outperform human teachers in driving student achievement.
At Alpha School, core academic instruction—including reading and math—is condensed into a daily two-hour period powered by adaptive AI software.
Instead of licensed teachers leading traditional lectures, adult non-academic guides or coaches monitor students and conduct afternoon workshops focused on life skills, public speaking, entrepreneurship, art, and physical education.
Tuition for the Tulsa location is set at $40,000 annually, fitting into a broader national trend where AI-centric private schools like Unbound Academy and Khan Lab School charge between $40,000 and $75,000 per year.
Over the past decade, Alpha School has grown from a single campus in Austin, Texas, to over 15 locations nationwide, including sites in New York and San Francisco.
Supporters and Administrators Defend the Model
Proponents argue that traditional, one-size-fits-all classrooms fail students who learn at varying speeds.
"It meets them at the exact level and pace that they are at, and as a result, our students are able to do so well on their academics in a much shorter period of time," said Mackenzie Price, Co-Founder of Alpha School.
"That frees up the rest of the school day to focus on developing life skills by doing group and project-based workshops."
Administrators emphasize the precision of automated instruction.
"From an academic perspective, we're using a learning platform that is powered by artificial intelligence, that is able to very precisely and accurately assess what a student knows and doesn't know, and then builds out a personalized lesson plan that's based on the same curriculum that students in a traditional classroom are getting, but it is then fed to a student at the level and pace that matches that student's ability," said Price.
School leadership also rejects claims that automated software isolates students from social development.
"We are able to provide our students with more time to connect with each other, and more time to connect with the adults in the classroom, our guides," said Price.
"In fact, our students spend less time on computer screens than the average student in the United States is spending in a traditional classroom."
Despite the commercial growth of automated platforms, educational research indicates that AI instruction is most effective when supporting human educators rather than replacing them.
While a 2020 National Bureau of Economic Research review confirmed that human tutoring consistently improves academic performance, extensive analyses show no significant learning difference between standalone AI tutors and human teachers.
Additionally, studies published in 2024 and 2026 indicate that AI tools deliver the highest learning gains in low-income schools when human tutors use them for support, and when experienced teachers utilize generative AI to refine lesson plans integrated into broader school curricula.
