Job Description
AI can teach a six-year-old to read. It cannot teach her to care. That difference is where you come in.
At Alpha, students in grades K-2 complete their academics through AI-driven apps in two hours each day. No lectures. No worksheets. You spend half your time facilitating one-hour workshops focused on life skills: public speaking, focus, and how to give and receive feedback. A playbook is provided, but the strongest performers in this role tailor it to their group and create new activities when the existing ones fall short. The other half of your time is spent working with students individually or in small groups—reviewing Coachbot analytics and coaching each child toward 100% completion of their weekly app goals. Warmth opens the door to pushing. Pushing shows them you know they can succeed.
A successful quarter means every student completes their weekly app goals, passes the Test2Pass for every life-skills workshop, and at least 90% say they love you. Fall short on any one of those three and the job is incomplete. In your first year you internalize the playbook; once you demonstrate you can maintain that standard, you become eligible for Lead Guide, where you mentor new hires while continuing to run your own cohort.
If you prefer traditional teaching, expect a fully scripted curriculum, or see warmth and rigor as incompatible, this role is not for you. If you have experience as an early-elementary teacher who excelled in circle time, a camp counselor for young children, a youth sports coach, or a children's theater performer, the final step before receiving an offer is a shadow day coaching actual Alpha students. Apply today.
What You Will Be Doing
• Facilitating one-hour life-skills workshops for K-2 cohorts on topics including public speaking, focus, feedback, and other foundational skills, tailoring the playbook to your group rather than delivering it verbatim.
• Conducting daily individual and small-group coaching sessions that ensure every student stays on track to meet weekly app goals, leveraging Coachbot analytics, Alpha's incentive structures (school currency, leaderboards), and the trust you build with each child.
• Administering Test2Pass, Alpha's mastery-based assessment, for each life skill, and coaching students who do not pass on the first attempt until they achieve mastery.
• Engaging kindergarteners where they are—through songs, stories, movement, and play—while maintaining real, measurable expectations for first and second graders.
• Serving as the warm, trusted adult kids are excited to see at drop-off AND the adult who will not let them settle for less than their best.
What You Won’t Be Doing
• Delivering lessons from the front of the room. Academic content is delivered through the apps, not by you.
• Creating curriculum from the ground up. Alpha supplies the playbook; you execute and adapt it.
• Passively monitoring students on computers. Motivation in this role is hands-on, personal, and continuous.
• Adjusting a weekly target downward so a student can meet it. When a student falls behind, the solution is to support the student, not lower the bar.
• Grading assignments, running standardized test prep sessions, or handling parent communication. Campus Leads manage parent-facing responsibilities, and the other tasks do not exist in this role.
2nd Grade Teacher Key Responsibilities
Ensure every student in your K-2 cohort completes their weekly learning goals, achieves mastery in each life skill, and finishes the year saying they loved you.
Basic Requirements
• Willing to work on-site at an Alpha campus in La Jolla (San Diego), Lake Forest (Orange County), Palo Alto, Piedmont, San Francisco, Santa Monica, or South Bay (LA), CA; Greenwich, CT; Boca Raton, Miami, Miami Beach, or Palm Beach Gardens, FL; Chicago, IL; or Boston, MA (relocation support provided).
• Bachelor's degree in any subject.
• At least 3 years working directly with children ages 4 to 7 (early-elementary teaching, coaching, tutoring, camp counseling, or youth program leadership).
• A specific example you can describe of motivating a young child to a hard goal: the goal, what you did, and the outcome.
• Willingness to let AI handle the instructional content while you focus on motivation and life-skills coaching.
• Willingness to hold high standards with students even when they push back.
• Legally authorized to work in the US without visa sponsorship.
Nice-to-have Requirements
• Experience in youth athletics coaching, children's theater, camp leadership, Montessori/progressive early education, or after-school programs where you were directly responsible for motivating young kids toward specific goals.
• Personal history of high achievement (academic, athletic, or professional), such that holding others to a hard bar is a pattern, not a posture.
• Natural performer's presence with little kids: the ability to hold a room of kindergarteners through voice, silliness, and movement.
• Track record of turning shy or resistant little kids into confident, active participants.
About Alpha
Want to join a learning rebellion that’s transforming the traditional classroom?
Alpha School is on a mission to reshape education with a bold approach that harnesses AI to accelerate learning and unleash student potential.
They don’t play by the old rules.
Alpha is creating a new paradigm where students master core academics in just two hours a day, freeing up time for hands-on, passion-driven learning that truly prepares them for the real world.
Alpha School is rewriting the rules of education.
Sounds too good to be true? It’s not.
There is so much to cover for this exciting role, and space here is limited. Hit the Apply button if you found this interesting and want to learn more. We look forward to meeting you!
Working with us
This is a full-time (40 hours per week), long-term position. The position is immediately available and requires entering into an independent contractor agreement with Crossover as a Contractor of Record. The compensation level for this role is $60 USD/hour, which equates to $120,000 USD/year assuming 40 hours per week and 50 weeks per year. The payment period is weekly. Consult www.crossover.com/help-and-faqs for more details on this topic.
Crossover Job Code: LJ-5634-US-Austin-2ndGradeTeache.004