Lowell Jay Milken is an American businessman, philanthropist, and the co-founder and chairman of the Milken Family Foundation. He is also the founder of the National Institute for Excellence in Teaching, TAP System for Teacher and Student Advancement as well as co-founder of Knowledge Universe, the world’s largest provider of early childhood education from 2005 until 2016. He is known for his advocacy and nonprofit leadership focused on K-12 American education reform. In 2017, he was the recipient of the James Bryant Conant Award for exceptional contributions to American Education. Lowell Milken has founded several more nonprofit organizations, including the Lowell Milken Family Foundation and the Lowell Milken Center for Unsung Heroes. In 2000, he was named one of America's most generous philanthropists by Worth magazine and has been listed for the past 7 years in the Los Angeles Business Journal’s LA500 list of the most influential and impactful executives in Los Angeles.

Michael Robert Milken is an American financier. He is known for his role in the development of the market for high-yield bonds, and his conviction and sentence following a guilty plea on felony charges for violating U.S. securities laws. Milken's compensation while head of the high-yield bond department at Drexel Burnham Lambert in the late 1980s exceeded $1 billion over a four-year period, a record for U.S. income at that time. With a net worth of US$6 billion as of 2022, he is among the richest people in the world.