StayQrious

StayQrious is a Bengaluru-based education company that operates StayQrious Neoschool, a fully remote school for children in Grades 3 to 8, with an IGCSE pathway by Grade 10. Instruction is entirely project-based: students work in pods of eight with a single coach for about four hours a day, Monday to Friday (9:30am-2:30pm IST). Projects typically run two to four weeks and require children to apply underlying concepts to a real-world task, such as investigating an issue and building an evidence-based argument, auditing food labels using decimals and percentages, designing and testing popsicle-stick bridges, or costing and pitching a cloud-kitchen menu.

The curriculum covers Math, Science, ELA and Computational Thinking at every grade, with topics that carry later dependencies taught in more depth and revisited across years; content judged not to affect IGCSE readiness is deliberately omitted. Roughly 40% of student time is allocated to what the company calls durable skills — communication, collaboration, emotional resilience, learning how to learn, financial literacy, and critical thinking and problem solving. The school is accredited by Cambridge and holds two offsites a year for pods to meet in person.

Earlier, the company operated as an after-school online programme focused on STEM foundations and coding, teaching essential 21st-century skills such as collaboration, critical thinking and creativity through small virtual classrooms using interactive video, written explanations, peer feedback and explainer videos, with a coach-led format compared to personalised fitness training. The learning environment is described by the company as designed by dedicated learning engineers on principles of cognitive science and behavioural economics.

Founding story

Aanand Srinivas, a computer engineer from NIT Trichy who specialised in artificial intelligence and began his career as a physics teacher, concluded that lecturing was ineffective and that teachers should act as learning coaches. He created content for online platforms and became the first Content Head of Khan Academy India and later Head of Content at BYJU'S, with lessons he shaped viewed more than 20 million times. He founded StayQrious to build a school that teaches children to think rather than memorise. Inc42 reports the company was founded in 2020 by Shankar Ram A, Avinash Anand and Aanand Srinivas; EdTechReview dates the founding to early 2020.

Business model

StayQrious sells schooling directly to families as a paid, fully remote programme. The company's site states a fee of Rs. 2,20,000, and admissions run by academic year for Grades 3-8. In its earlier after-school format, the company charged Rs 1,000 for a first trial month and Rs 20,000 for the complete package, reduced to Rs 15,000 for students receiving a 25% scholarship.

Tuition fees paid by parents; the current stated fee is Rs. 2,20,000, with earlier after-school packages priced at Rs 20,000 (Rs 1,000 trial month).

Traction

The school reports 150+ families/children enrolled across India and the Gulf and a 4.9 rating on its site, having opened with four pods of eight. The company states its masterclasses reached lakhs of students and that tens of thousands became paying students. A 2022 report described the Neoschool programme as having over 100 coaches and more than 1 lakh students. Y Combinator lists a team size of 29, while a co-founder's YC profile describes building a 150+ member organisation.

Latest developments

Admissions are open for Grades 3-8 for academic year 2026-27. The company describes itself as Y Combinator-backed and Cambridge accredited, with Dr. Brian Johnsrud, formerly Director of Learning at Stanford, serving as curriculum advisor. In 2022 the founder said the company planned to add verticals in applied mathematics and financial literacy.