Head of the Class

Thanks to a roster of A-plus investors, AltSchool has built one of edtech’s biggest war chests. Meet the smart money taking the big risk.

MARK ZUCKERBERG

chan Zuckerberg initiative Zuckerberg and wife Priscilla chan have invested more than $300 million in edtech companies, nonprofits and school districts. Zuck wrote to his infant daughter maxima in 2015: “you’ll have technology that understands how you learn best and where you need to focus.”

PETER THIEL

founders fund the stanford alum is known for hating traditional education, and his vc fund invests in an array of education companies, including adaptive-learning software makers declara and knewton. “i think one of the downsides of too much education is that you get the most brainwashed.”

LAURENE POWELL JOBS

emerson collective emerson has pledged $130 million to 19 public schools across the country. “school was the thing that really worked for me . . . . i know it in my core that, without that, i never would have had the opportunities that i have in my life.”

MARC ANDREESSEN

Andreessen horowitz Among the companies Andreessen’s vc firm is backing: Wonderschool, a network of home-based child-care centers, and mooc provider udacity. “the classroom of the future is going to be much more software-powered than it is today.”

PIERRE OMIDYAR

omidyar network the ebay founder’s impact-investing firm supports nearly 100 education ventures, from teachers’-instruction content platform learnZillion to free instructional-video producer khan Academy. “you’ll fail at some things—that’s a learning experience that you need so that you can take that on to the next experience.”