Dr. Dre, Jimmy Iovine to open high school in Inglewood as the district faces school closures

Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine — in their second recent public school venture — announced Monday they are partnering with the Inglewood Unified School District to open a new high school, a project the district hopes will lure students and bring a dose of vitality to a district that has been forced to close schools amid declining enrollment for the past decade.

The announcement at Morningside High School featured the Inglewood High School marching band and cheerleaders, who welcomed Iovine, co-founder of Interscope Records, to an auditorium packed with district employees and community members.

Amela Perry performs with other Inglewood High band members during a district teachers seminar at Morningside High, where record producer and philanthropist Jimmy Iovine, back right in dark blue jacket, introduced the Iovine and Young Center in the Inglewood Unified School District. Starting in the summer of 2025, the initiative will offer a cutting-edge, interdisciplinary curriculum aimed at training young leaders, innovators and entrepreneurs.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

The Iovine and Young Center will open in summer 2025 for ninth-grade students and expand each year until it reaches the 12th grade in 2028. The center will focus on creative skill development and social impact, culminating with a senior-year capstone project giving students an opportunity to solve real-world problems.

“[Dr. Dre and Iovine] will be investing in state of the art technology, professional development for staff, and any requisite campus improvements necessary to create the new academy,” district spokesperson Jessica Ochoa said.

Record producer and philanthropist Jimmy Iovine captures the Inglewood High marching band as it performs at Morningside High.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

The school will be located on the campus of Crozier Middle School, which is slated to close in June 2025, Ochoa said.

“We wanted to start in the inner city, because Dre and especially me, I owe a lot to the inner city of Los Angeles and we intend to pay it back,” Iovine said.

The Inglewood school announcement comes two years after the music moguls established a Los Angeles Unified high school in the Leimert Park neighborhood focused on interdisciplinary learning and entrepreneurial talent. The school is housed at at Audubon Middle School, which was also facing steep enrollment declines in 2021.

In the Inglewood district, middle-class families have increasingly been sending their children to charter schools or Los Angeles district schools, while low-income families are being priced out due to rising rent costs. Low birth rates and gentrification have also brought on steep enrollment declines.

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“We’re going to have the NBA All-Star weekend, FIFA World Cup and the Olympics, but what’s most important is what our kids, the next generation, get out of all this,” Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts Jr. said. “We want parents to want to put their children in the Inglewood Unified School District, because that’s the only future for this district.”

Inglewood High cheer squad members perform with the marching band during a school district conference at Morningside High.

(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Times)

The long-troubled Inglwood district is operating under receivership after fiscal mismanagement forced the district to take out a $29-million emergency loan from the state in 2012. The Los Angeles County Office of Education has since taken over the district, giving the county-appointed administrator sole power over the district’s financial decisions until a path to stability and solvency is attained.

County Administrator James Morris said the new high school is an example of the rapid progress the district is making to pull itself out of receivership.

“Inglewood is on the move,” he said.

Student applications will open this winter or spring, Ochoa said. Academic criteria will not be used in the selection process, she added. Rather, student interest in innovation and creative pursuits will be valued.

Yet emotions among some attendees were mixed as the district faces five school closures by June 2025 — about the same time the new high school will open — and the district’s financial decisions remain out of local control.

Inglewood Unified School District Board President Carliss McGhee told the auditorium filled with parents and staff, “We have been in receivership for far too long. The Iovine and Young Center will bring real-world applications to our students.”

Some teachers praised the new high school but said the district should also extend its resources to paying teachers a higher, livable wage, which would directly increase the quality of education for its students.

“What about us?” said Toni Butler, a teacher at La Tijera K-8 Charter School Academy of Excellence.