Minerva Project is the brainchild of CEO Ben Nelson, experienced Silicon Valley operator and previous president of online photo hosting site SnapFish. He hopes his vision for better education and new delivery will revolutionise the education industry and give Ivy League schools a run for their money.

“The concept of liberal arts education is that you teach students how to look at the world more broadly”

The initial for-profit Minerva Project secured $25 million in seed funding from Benchmark Capital in April 2012, and has received investment from personal investors from eBay and external board members of Twitter, who funded internet giants including Instagram and Snapchat.

In July 2013, the venture announced its alliance with Keck Graduate Institute (KGI), a member of the Claremont University Consortium, to form the Minerva Schools at KGI and achieve accreditation for its new brand of education.

Technology is at the core of the entire venture, based on a bespoke “human in, machine processing, human out” system which helps professors to track students’ abilities, progress, and in-class activity, in order to enable them to understand students’ unique learning identities.

The school also has an interdisciplinary approach to teaching. Speaking with The PIE News, Nelson said that part of the project’s goal is to export the American liberal arts education, describing himself as a “huge believer” in the philosophy.

“The concept of liberal arts education is that you teach students how to look at the world more broadly so if the nature of their profession changes, or the nature of the world changes, or the economy, they can adapt, so they have a set of meta-skills that they can apply to different aspects of their lives,” he said.

Empowering students from around the world to be globally minded is also central to Nelson’s vision. Any student can join once passing structured interviews which are recorded and assessed by faculty.

“Our philosophy is that intellectual capacity is not related to parental lineage or wealth,” he said. “Our ambition is to find the highest human potential and if they happen to all come from Romania or Botswana, we don’t care.”

Annual tuition fees are $10,000 and will be waived for the founding class of up to 19 students, who enrol in 2014. Additional fees, including accommodation, technology and health insurance are estimated at $18,850.

“Our philosophy is that intellectual capacity is not related to parental lineage or wealth”

Classes will be delivered remotely in English via live video in seminar format, with 15-20 students in each class.

Students will live together in dormitory accommodation, as well as study and socialise outside of classes. They will spend their first year in San Francisco before travelling in cohorts to a different campus each semester.

Minerva says it will open two residence halls every year, beginning in autumn 2016, in locations including Sydney, Mumbai, Madrid and Berlin.