Milken Family Foundation Chairman and Co-Founder Lowell Milken’s reputation as a visionary leader of education reform has been honed by more than three decades of education research, policy and practices—as well as firsthand visits to thousands of classrooms and the creation of major national initiatives. Under Lowell’s guidance since its establishment in 1982, the Milken Family Foundation has become one of the nation’s most innovative private foundations, developing groundbreaking programs in K-12 education as well as medical research, and helping to fund more than 1,000 organizations worldwide with compatible missions.

Among his contributions to strengthening K-12 education, Lowell conceived the Milken Educator Awards, first presented in 1987 to recognize the importance of outstanding educators and to encourage talented young people to choose teaching as a career. With a network of over 2,400 recipients across the United States, the Milken Educator Awards, is the nation's preeminent teacher recognition program.

Recognizing that sufficient numbers of quality teachers would never result from current education practices, Lowell launched TAP™: The System for Teacher and Student Advancement in 1999 as a comprehensive research-based strategy to attract, develop, motivate and retain highly effective teachers for America's schools. By creating an environment with powerful and sustained opportunities for career advancement, professional growth, teacher accountability and competitive compensation, TAP's proven system has expanded to impact more than 7,500 teachers and 85,000 students.

Based on TAP's rapid growth, strong results and high demand, Lowell established the National Institute for Excellence in Teaching (NIET) in 2005 as an independent public charity to operate TAP. Equipped with a staff drawn from education and business, NIET forges partnerships with schools, governments, corporations and foundations to ensure TAP's effectiveness and sustainability in a diverse set of urban, rural and suburban schools across America. President Barack Obama has highlighted the "promising work" of TAP in helping to ensure that "anyone entrusted with educating our children is doing the job as well as it can be done."

The Lowell Milken Center, was founded in 2007 in partnership with Milken Educator Norman Conard (KS '92) to galvanize a movement for teaching respect and understanding among all people, regardless of race, religion or creed. More than 2,000 schools in all 50 states and internationally partner with the LM Center to pursue this mission via educational projects using unsung heroes as role models to "repair the world."

In 1990, Lowell created the Milken Archive of American Jewish Music to explore the vast panorama of sacred and secular works reflecting 350 years of Jewish life in America. This historic recording project has grown to encompass 700 newly recorded works—500 of them world-premiere recordings—and more than 800 hours of oral history videos. Naxos American Classics has released 50 CDs available in over 50 countries. In mid-2010, the Milken Archive will launch its new “virtual museum” Web site.

Further education efforts championed by Lowell include Lowell Milken HighTech-Los Angeles, a public charter school that engages students with a rigorous curriculum rich in technology and complemented by real-world internships. The school’s initial lead grant was a commitment from the Lowell Milken Family Foundation. Officially dedicated in 2004, HT-LA achieved California Distinguished School status in record time. The state-of-the-art Milken Community High School is a private Jewish day school based in Los Angeles and known nationally for its college preparatory curriculum.

Recognition for Lowell's achievements in education has included awards from organizations such as the National Association of State Boards of Education, the Horace Mann League, the National Association of Secondary School Principals, Jewish Theological Seminary, Hebrew Union College and UCLA School of Law.

Named by Worth magazine as one of America's most generous philanthropists, Lowell is also an involved businessman who chairs London-based Heron International, a worldwide leader in property development, and Knowledge Universe, Inc., a leading company in early childhood education and educational programs and services.

Lowell Milken is a product of California's public school system, graduating Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude from the University of California at Berkeley, where he received the School of Business Administration's Most Outstanding Student Award. He earned his law degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, with the distinctions of Order of the Coif and UCLA Law Review. His four sons inspire and deepen his commitment to the Milken Family Foundation.

Recent Honors

UCLA School of Law Dean Michael H. Schill presents 2009 Alumnus of the Year Award for Public and Community Service to Lowell Milken.
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Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion honors Lowell Milken with a Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa.
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“In business, the most important lesson I have learned is that there is one currency that always plays the key role in forming value, and that is human capital—the knowledge, skills and experiences of people. In K-12 education, the same principle applies. We know from research that aside from home and family, the single most important factor driving student performance is the quality of the teacher in the classroom. The difference between an effective and ineffective teacher can be a full grade level of student achievement in a single year.”