David Geffen gives $100 million to build a school for the children of UCLA staff and others

Entertainment industry billionaire David Geffen, who previously gave $300 million to support UCLA’s medical school, is donating $100 million to establish a private middle and high school on the Westwood campus partly for the children of faculty and staff.

Geffen and UCLA Chancellor Gene Block described the new school in part as a recruiting and retention tool for faculty and scientists who may be worried about the cost of living in Los Angeles and the education system here. For younger students, the long-established UCLA Lab School enrolls many children of faculty in pre-kindergarten through the 6th grade, but its graduates then must go to public or private schools elsewhere.

UCLA has “not been able to attract certain talent because of the costs of educating their children,” Geffen said in a telephone interview. LA Times