Straight answers about what the Academy is, who teaches it, what it costs, how your team can join and how it compares with other ways to learn AI.
Last reviewed October 17, 2026
Next Pillar Academy is a paid online AI community and school for business owners. Members learn to put AI to work in the business they run, with a classroom that starts at the beginning, a live call every week with the hosts, AI News, a weekly report and a community of other owners.
It costs $97 a month or $970 a year, with a 30-day money-back guarantee. It is run by Next Pillar Capital LLC and opened in October 2026. About the Academy
Next Pillar Academy is for people who own or run a business and want AI doing real work in it.
It is for you if:
It is not for you if:
Will Taubenheim teaches Foundations and hosts the weekly call, with co-host Joe Staiber.
Will Taubenheim is an AI engineer. On the Terasynth team he won four awards in NASA's LunaRecycle Challenge, including second place overall in the prototype track and People's Choice at the 2026 finale. His AI work for the U.S. military: missile-defense AI for Navy destroyers, an autonomous wildfire-suppression award from NAWCTSD and SERDP, and an Air Force Global Strike Command down-select.
Joe Staiber, the co-host: Co-founder and CEO of Tampa Entrepreneurs, a non-profit that hosts free events for business owners around Tampa Bay. CEO of Autoscale, which builds AI sales and marketing systems, and founder of the PR agency NewsFeature. Built and sold two e-commerce businesses, and speaks internationally on sales and paid ads.
The advisors are Nick Maciel (automation and operations), Darren Lau (AI research and policy) and Georgi Gospodinov, PhD (AI and data systems). Meet the hosts
Will Taubenheim's four NASA awards are team awards from NASA's LunaRecycle Challenge, won on the Terasynth team with its Lunar Re-Forge System:
NASA's and the University of Alabama's announcements name the team, Terasynth. NASA says the challenge drew more than 1,200 registrations, more than any competition in the 20-year history of its Centennial Challenges. NASA does not endorse Next Pillar Academy.
Both. A membership includes every course in the Classroom, the weekly live call with every replay, AI News, the weekly report, the community feed and the member directory. Nothing is behind a tier or a credit.
No. Next Pillar Academy runs on its own platform at nextpillaracademy.com, built by Next Pillar, so the classroom, the live calls, AI News and the community are all in one place. It works in your browser, on a computer or a phone.
No. Foundations starts at the beginning: how AI actually works, why it costs money, how to talk to it well, and what never goes in the chat. AI tools and accounts are not included; Start here helps you pick one.
It starts with Start here, a short first module: pick your assistant, write a one-page file about your company and hand over one real task. Then Foundations, taken in order at your own pace:
Every lesson has a transcript, and search finds words inside every lesson and replay.
Next Pillar Academy has a live call every week with the hosts. Bring a question from your own business: the call is where we go deeper.
The day and time are on the calendar inside the Academy, which you can add to your own calendar once; Join live opens about ten minutes before.
Every call is recorded. The replay goes up in the Classroom with chapters, captions and a transcript you can search.
You bring your own AI assistant: AI tools and accounts are not included in the membership. The Start here module helps you pick one, and Foundations teaches ideas that work in any of them.
A mobile app is coming soon. Until then there is nothing to download: the Academy runs in your browser, on a computer or a phone, and on a phone you can add it to your home screen so it opens full-screen with its own icon, like an app.
On an iPhone, open it in Safari, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen. On Android, open it in Chrome and tap Install.
Yes. Buy seats for your staff in one purchase. Each person gets their own account with every course, the weekly call and the replays, and you get one bill. Discounts start at 5 seats, up to 20% off.
Prices are per seat, per month or per year. Seats added part-way through a period are prorated on your next invoice.
Yes. Besides the membership, Next Pillar works directly with owners and companies:
These are optional. Nothing here is pushed at you in the community. Work with Next Pillar
Next Pillar Academy costs $97 a month, or $970 a year, which saves $194 against paying monthly. You are charged when you join, and it renews at the same price until you cancel.
Every member gets every course, the weekly call and the replays on either plan. There are no tiers and nothing is behind a credit.
Yes. The yearly plan is $970 a year, which saves $194 against paying $97 every month: 2 months free.
There is no free trial on the ordinary membership. Instead there is a 30-day money-back guarantee. Some event offers and personal invitations include free time, and their pages say so; the Terms list them.
Yes: a 30-day money-back guarantee. To use it, email support within 30 days of your first charge and we will refund that charge in full. It covers your first payment on either the monthly or the yearly plan, and it is available once per person. If it is used again and again to get the Academy for free, we may say no. After the 30 days, we do not refund time you have already paid for; if you cancel, your access runs to the end of that period.
In Settings → Billing, at any time. Cancelling stops the next renewal; your access continues to the end of the period you have already paid for.
It can, with notice. If we change the price, we will tell you at least 30 days before it applies to your next renewal, and you can cancel before then. Founding members keep the price they joined at for as long as they stay.
We do not sell member information or use it for ads, and your card number never reaches us. Other members see your first name and last initial, never your email or phone number.
We use activity, de-identified, to improve the courses. What you write (posts, comments, your profile and your searches) stays out of any AI analysis unless you agree to it.
Not all of it. What is safe to share depends on the tool, the plan you are on and what you owe your customers, so Foundations teaches a simple rule for it:
Next Pillar Academy pairs a classroom that starts at the beginning with a live call every week, where you can ask the hosts about your own business. Free courses and course libraries are self-paced, usually with no live time with people. A course library is the better choice if you want many subjects beyond AI, or a dashboard to assign courses to staff and track them today.
Next Pillar Academy is built for people who run a business and want AI working in it, where many AI communities teach AI automation or how to start an AI agency. It starts at the beginning, follows one order, and is taught by Will Taubenheim, an AI engineer with four NASA awards, with co-host Joe Staiber. It runs on its own platform, built by Next Pillar.