David Geffen, the billionaire entertainment executive, will donate $100 million to the University of California, Los Angeles, to help medical students graduate without debt.
The David Geffen Medical Scholarship Fund will cover four years of tuition, fees and living expenses for as many as 33 students a year, or 20 percent of the class, UCLA said in a statement on its website yesterday. The cost of medical school can exceed $300,000 for four years, and average debt for U.S. medical graduates was $170,000 in 2012, UCLA said.
Geffen, 69, is a founder of Asylum Records and DreamWorks SKG Studios. He donated $200 million in 2002 to UCLA’s medical school, which was renamed in his honor. With more than $300 million pledged, Geffen is the largest individual benefactor of UCLA or any single University of California campus, according to the statement.
“The cost of a world-class medical education should not deter our future innovators, doctors and scientists from the path they hope to pursue,” Geffen said in the statement. “We need the students at this world-class institution to be driven by determination and the desire to do their best work and not by the fear of crushing debt.”