ASU Preparatory Academy in Tempe, powered by The Levitt Lab, recently tabulated results of an academic assessment. The assessment showed students significantly outperforming national scores in core academic areas, including Math, English Language Arts and Reading. The tuition-free public school is now enrolling students in grades 9 through 12 for fall 2026.
ASU Prep’s hybrid learning model utilizes a mastery-based approach, allowing students to accelerate and personalize their learning. Core courses and in-depth exploration projects are completely flexible, ensuring students can learn at their own pace and set their own schedule.
Betsy Fowler, ASU Preparatory Academy Chief of Staff, joined “Arizona Horizon” to discuss how The Levitt Lab is reshaping education.
Fowler says the Levitt Lab got its name from economist Steve Levitt, who partners with ASU Preparatory Academy.
“You might recognize the name in that title. Levitt is referencing Steve Levitt, author of ‘Freakonomics,’ who is a collaborative partner with us. ASU Prep Tempe is our main name of our campus, but we’re collaborating with Steve and his community out of the University of Chicago’s Risk Center, and so they’re pushing us. He’s known for being kind of an iconoclast in that field of economics,” Fowler said.
Unlike a traditional school, the Levitt Lab doesn’t assign letter grades. Instead, the school has established a clear criteria to define mastery and proficient levels of understanding.
“Our goal is for students to not play the game of school and try to do the minimum amount of learning that it takes.
We got some big problems we got to solve in the world now. We want them to really focus on actually learning. So we don’t have A, B, C, D, F, like maybe a typical school does, but we use the terms mastery and proficient. There’s really clear targets,” Fowler said.
