Startups & Funding
a16z launches a tuition-free school for founders who skip college
Andreessen Horowitz is launching The Horowitz Andreessen Academy, a San Francisco school for recent high school graduates that charges no tuition in its first year and aims to train aspiring founders through hands-on coursework and mentorship.
The academy targets aspiring founders who have just graduated high school and haven’t yet attended college, offering coursework ranging from technical subjects like “AI Research and Models” to life-philosophy classes such as “The Geometry of Luck,” which promises to teach students “about arranging a life so good fortune flows through it.” Students will also work on personal projects, and the school’s main pitch is that it provides mentors who are well-known names in tech.
The academy is currently accepting applications for its first year, a one-year program that charges no tuition and is open to about 50 students “chosen on proof of work: what they have built, shipped, or earned,” according to the school’s FAQ. It is located in San Francisco, and students are responsible for their own housing, though the school says it is working to help them find it and match them with roommates. The academy is not currently an accredited school, so participants won’t earn a degree or transferable college credits.
In 2028, the academy — a for-profit venture that has raised $42 million — hopes to offer a two-year program, at which point it plans to charge tuition “similar in cost to an elite private university,” CEO Gagan Biyani said in a post on X. The school, open to high school graduates even if they are younger than 18, may also expand beyond about 50 students in the future, an a16z spokesperson told TechCrunch. In exchange for that tuition, students would gain access to 200 speakers and mentors, including people from 10 founding corporate partners: Anduril, Anthropic, Coinbase, Google, Meta, Nvidia, OpenAI, Palantir, Replit, and Stripe. Those companies and dozens of others hope to hire from the school’s graduates, Biyani said.
The founders describe the academy as a new middle ground between earning a full degree before entering tech and dropping out to start a company: unlike Y Combinator’s short-term, funding-focused model or Peter Thiel’s Fellowship for young people who skip college, these students will pay tuition, gain tech-trade skills, and have an inside track to industry jobs — or build a startup with access to substantial mentorship.
Why it matters
At a moment when AI is squeezing entry-level tech hiring, a16z is betting that direct access to jobs and mentors, not a degree, is what young talent will pay for.