Steve Jobs’ Widow Pumping Millions Into High School Education

Laurene Powell Jobs has bolstered her commitment to help improve the U.S. education system with the announcement of a $50 million project to create new high schools.

Jobs, the widow of Apple founder Steve Jobs, told the New York Times that an initiative called “XO: The Super School Project” would explore potential efforts to alter school curriculums and technologies in a bid to develop new educational methods. Ultimately, Jobs said, the goal would be to select as many as 10 of the best concepts to financially back.

The high-profile move to improve high school education isn’t the first foray by Jobs, who also co-founded and financially backs College Track, which helps guide high school students who want to be the first in their families to attend college achieve that goal.

Some of the tech industry’s highest profile names have donated millions to similar causes. Most notably, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in 2014 announced he would give $120 million to Bay Area schools. That came several years after he donated $100 million to Newark, N.J., schools – a gift some say ran into notable woes.