[ FE ATURES ]
Driven by a
shared passion for education, EJ Milken (left) and Gregory A. Milken, C’95 (right), support innovation, faculty, and students at Penn GSE.
Believing in Education GREGORY A. MILKEN, C’95, AND EJ MILKEN CONTINUE A TRADITION by Karen Doss Bowman
F
or Gregory A. Milken, C’95, supporting education is a family tradition. “My family is passionate about education, and we’re big believers that education makes a huge difference in a person’s life,” says Gregory, an international businessman who has worked for and invested in numerous technology startup companies. His parents’ philanthropy sparked his multifaceted commitment to education—and the new traditions he has created with his family at Penn GSE. Gregory was a teenager when his parents, Lori Milken, GED’72, and Michael Milken, WG’70, established the Milken
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Scholars Program as an initiative of the California-based Milken Family Foundation. Around the same time, his mother, a GSE alumna, began her term on the Penn GSE Board of Overseers. Having seen the impact of both organizations up close from an early age, Gregory has spent the past ten years as director of the Milken Scholars— and followed in his mother’s footsteps by serving on the Board of Overseers at GSE. “Education is the path to a better job and a better life,” says Gregory, cofounder and managing director of March Capital Partners, a global investment firm. “It’s very hard to achieve the American Dream without
education, and I’ve seen that reflected in the programs my family supports and operates.” Since its inception, the Milken Scholars program, now jointly run by the Milken Institute, has provided financial support and mentoring to over four hundred students from New York City, Washington, DC, and Los Angeles. Selected on the basis of their accomplishments and ability to overcome obstacles, the scholars have a 99 percent college graduation rate, with many going on to graduate school and becoming leaders in their fields. “Many of the Milken Scholars have been the first in their family to attend college or
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