I’m a firm believer that every child should enjoy school. And that it’s possible for every child to enjoy school. It’s just a matter of discovering what kind of school works best for your child.This belief has led to two businesses:💡 Minerva Virtual Academy: An online independent school for 11-18-year-olds🦉 MVA Tutors: A world-class homeschooling &amp; private tutoring agency for 5-18-year-oldsKeen to learn more? Hit Follow + Alternatively, my DMs are always open for anyone wanting to chat ⚡

Minerva Virtual Academy (MVA) has been nominated for both Online School of the Year AND Secondary School of the Year at 2026’s Edufuturists Awards! But it’s not the awards I’m (most) excited about.

Edufuturists events are always a hotbed of big thinkers, passionate changemakers, and roomfulls of people who are determined to make education better for all.

It’s my kind of people, and my kind of conversations.

If you’ll be joining us in Liverpool, be sure to grab me for a chat.

Hugh Viney

Founder & CEO of the UK’s fastest growing school @ Minerva Virtual Academy | Education Innovator | Speaker | Dad

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There is a crisis in UK education that cost £1.7 BILLION last year, a number that has risen 170% in 8 years, and we simply aren’t speaking about it.

Last year, this staggering amount of money was spent on transporting children with SEND needs to and from school.

That’s it. £1.7 billion, with a B, all to transport kids (in some cases hundreds of miles) to schools that may not even properly meet their needs.

At some local authorities, these costs are almost a quarter of the entire education budget.

And look, I’m not blaming them. LAs are often in a desperate position, under pressure from the government to bring student numbers back up, and SEND kids are a prime demographic to target.

But this, much like the huge amounts of cash the government has been pouring into school buildings to make them more ‘SEND-friendly’, is missing the point.

What SEND kids need is schooling that meets them where they are and supports them, not being dragged halfway across the country to a building that may leave them overwhelmed, stressed, and struggling before quality of teaching is even taken into account.

This does not need to be happening.

Minerva Virtual Academy (MVA)'s results for SEND students last year blew the national averages away, and it’s not hard to see why.

Flexible, adaptable environments, 1:1 mentoring support, a fully trained SEND team, and zero need to be taxied halfway across the country every day.

If that £1.7 billion was instead spent on setting up a range of online state schools, this crisis, and the wider SEND education crisis, would disappear overnight.

We have to stop treating the symptoms and start looking at the root systems that have not worked for a long time – otherwise, the multiple crises we face will not go anywhere, and the bill will simply keep on rising.

Read the full report here: https://zurl.co/75LIr

This week at Minerva Virtual Academy (MVA) has been Enrichment Week, with a focus on Careers, and it has been fantastic.

What to do next is always one of the most daunting parts of school, even for kids who love it. Do I go to uni? Do I get a job? Do I start an apprenticeship? Do I take a gap year and travel? 

Well, MVA students will (hopefully) be feeling a bit more confident on the answers to those questions, as they’ve just spent the last week in workshops and presentations from Lloyds Bank,  Plan My Gap Year , Stemettes, Arden University, University of Lincoln, Unifrog, and more!

We also had an incredible cast of MVA Parents who willingly gave up some of their time to talk to the kids about their careers, and how they made it happen – this is my favourite part, by the way. MVA is a fantastic school, but our community is what makes us, in my opinion, the best.

A huge thank you everyone who has contributed to such an amazing week and to, in a small way, the futures of every MVA student who has come away feeling more confident about the future.

At events like No Fluff Fest, people always want to know the same thing:

How has MVA grown so fast?

The boring answer is, of course, that we’ve worked very hard to provide a world-class school experience that caters as best as we can to every family and child at every step of the way.

The simple answer is that we’re different.

In an educational landscape that has changed very little since the industrial revolution, different is good. It’s exciting, it’s refreshing, and it promises change.

Obviously, we would never have grown if we didn’t follow through on that promise, but the initial pull for parents is clear.

More of the same just isn’t viable.

Look, I’ll be honest, when we launched Minerva Virtual Academy (MVA), I was not sure we would see good exam results. Maybe ever.

We were built on a philosophy of happiness above all, and many of the kids turning to us were happy just to pass if it meant they could enjoy school again – and that was enough for me.

But now, with a few years of GCSEs under our belt, the trends are blowing those admittedly cautious expectations out of the water.

In core subjects, we’re outperforming the national average, and our results for students with SEND needs are beating out the national trends across the board.

The conclusion is clear – alternatives like MVA are not just last resorts for children who’ve been failed by the mainstream. Sometimes, it’s objectively the better option.

I’m seriously hoping that this year, with this proof in hand, we can begin to change minds and effect wider change beyond just our virtual halls.

One of the most revolutionary things about Minerva Virtual Academy (MVA) is not that it’s online.

We weren’t the first online school and, these days, we certainly aren’t the only one.

What sets our Academic Model apart is Flipped Learning.

MVA students spend roughly 60% of their time studying on a virtual platform, self-directed, in their own time. The remaining 40% is spent with teachers in Live Lessons.

Not only does this better suit a lot of kids, because they can learn at their own pace, but it also fits better around the practical realities of being a teenager.

Students can get as much sleep as they need, and learn when they focus best. No sleeping on the desk, no wasted mornings wishing you were back in bed. Let’s face it, for some kids, forcing them to start learning at 8am is needlessly making school harder for no reason other than wanting them to conform to a schedule.

We’re not looking to teach conformity. We’re looking to awaken potential.

And, sometimes, potential kicks in at lunchtime.

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