Kanye West’s Donda Academy closes amid anti-Semitic fallout

Donda Academy will discontinue ‘immediately’ as the impact of the rapper’s remarks made on social media continue to snowball.

Kanye West’s school charges $US15,000 a year and requires parents to sign non-disclosure agreements. Picture: Ashley Landis/AP/The Times

Parents whose children attend Kanye West’s school in southern California have been told it has closed with immediate effect as the controversy surrounding the rapper over his anti-Semitic comments continues to snowball.

In an email seen by The Times, Jason Angell, the principal of Donda Academy, said that “at the discretion of our founder, Donda Academy will close for the remainder of the 2022-23 school year effective immediately”. It planned to “begin afresh” next September.

Donda Academy, named after West’s late mother, charges $US15,000 ($23,240) a year and requires parents of its 100 pupils to sign non-disclosure agreements to prevent leaks. Its location in Simi Valley is a closely guarded secret.

The school, whose pupils wear uniforms made by the luxury fashion design house Balenciaga, promises a faith-based education with the promotion of Christian values alongside a “rigorous core curriculum”.

Its “enrichment courses” include film, choir and parkour, the sport of jumping over and off objects in urban environments.

Yesterday (Thursday), a high school basketball tournament said it would not include Donda Academy’s team, which had picked up some of the country’s top prospects.

Angell’s email said: “Our leadership team will be working diligently to assist all families during this transition, ensuring that every scholar has what they need to succeed in their next community in a prompt and gracious manner.”

Brands including Adidas and Balenciaga have severed ties with West, 45, who changed his name last year to Ye.

This month West tweeted that “I’m going death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE”.

This was in the same month as wearing a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt at Paris Fashion Week, and wearing a red baseball hat with “2024” on it, signalling his intention to have a second run at the presidency of the United States, after his abortive attempt in 2020.

The Times