NEWARK, N.J. – Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is about to make a lot of new friends: The 26-year-old tycoon is pouring $100 million of his staggering fortune into Newark’s blighted school system after hitting it off with the mayor of the poverty-stricken city.

The donation — which is being announced today on Oprah Winfrey’s show — instantly establishes Zuckerberg as one of high-tech’s biggest philanthropists and comes just ahead of the release of “The Social Network,” a movie that paints an unflattering portrait of the boy wonder of the Internet.

The arrangement brings together the young entrepreneur, Newark’s celebrated Democratic mayor and a governor who has become a star of the Republican Party. And it underscores how the remaking of the nation’s urban schools has become a popular cause among young philanthropists.

“What you’re seeing is for the under-40 set, education reform is what feeding kids in Africa was in 1980,” said Derrell Bradford, executive director of the Newark-based education reform group Excellent Education for Everyone. “Newark public schools are like the new Live Aid.”

Last year, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced $290 million in education grants, including $100 million for the school system in Tampa, Fla., and $90 million for the Memphis, Tenn., district. The Gates Foundation also has given more than $150 million to New York City schools over the past eight years.

Exactly how Zuckerberg’s donation will be used in Newark — a school system with about 40,000 students and a budget this year of $940 million — has not been disclosed.

The district has been plagued for years by low test scores, poor graduation rates and crumbling buildings and was taken over by the state in 1995 after instances of waste and mismanagement.

Zuckerberg grew up in Dobbs Ferry, N.Y., graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire in 2002 and attended Harvard before dropping out to work full time on Facebook. He has no connection to Newark other than knowing Mayor Cory Booker, a charismatic politician who has the ear of President Obama and has helped the city get donations from Winfrey and New Jersey’s Jon Bon Jovi.

According to The New York Times, Zuckerberg and Booker met at a conference over the summer and kept in touch.

The donation was first reported Wednesday night by The Star-Ledger of Newark. An official familiar with the plan confirmed it to The Associated Press on Thursday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because those involved were told not to steal the thunder from Winfrey’s show.

 

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