Universities ponder name change due to donor plea

The UC system is considering a change in name for some universities that have schools named after billionaire donor Henry Samueli, UC officials said.

UCI and UCLA have engineering schools named for Samueli, who donated large sums to the schools to get them off the ground.

But Samueli recently pleaded guilty to lying to financial regulators concerning the backdating of stock options given to employees at his Irvine-based Broadcom company.

With that news, the general counsel of the university will meet to determine whether Samueli’s name stays, a UC spokesperson said.

The decision to review the school’s name came within the last few days, following Samueli’s plea last month.

Officials from the Henry Samueli School of Engineering were not available for comment.

— Daniel Tedford