Musk runs secret online school for children, with 2-hour class costing $4,800

Elon Musk, owner of companies such as Tesla and SpaceX, is leading the race to become the world's first trillionaire. His vast wealth and unconventional ideas keep him in the news. Now a secret school he has started for children, and its fees, have left parents around the world astonished.

Musk says the world's traditional education system has failed completely to shape children's futures. Out of this thinking, he did not send his children to any ordinary or well-known school and started one of his own.

In 2014, Musk took his children out of traditional schools. He started a highly private school at SpaceX's California headquarters and named it Ad Astra, a Latin phrase meaning "to the stars". At first, the school mainly taught Musk's own children and the children of select SpaceX employees. The school was kept entirely secret, and instead of traditional subjects it taught about the modern world. It continues to run away from public view.

The school later expanded and in 2020 was opened to children worldwide under the name Astra Nova. Notably, it has no physical building. It runs entirely on a virtual, or online, basis. Designed for children aged 10 to 15, it allows students from any corner of the world to enrol from home through a screen.

Now to the fees. It is among the most expensive online classes in the world. At Astra Nova, a two-hour class is priced at $4,800, or about Rs 4 lakh. Under the school's rules, every student must enrol in at least two hours of classes. Depending on need, students can choose up to a maximum of 16 hours of classes. The annual tuition fee for this comes to about $36,000, or more than Rs 30.25 lakh.

The curriculum and teaching method are also different. Students are not given grades or marks, and there were no traditional examinations. Musk believes that, rather than spending time learning languages and music, children should be taught AI, coding, robotics and critical thinking. Instead of bookish knowledge, children are trained to solve practical problems such as synthesis and ethical dilemmas, that is, moral complexities.