A partnership that includes former junk bond king Michael Milken is looking for investors interested in putting as much as $1 billion into its educationrelated ventures.

Details of the offering were sketchy. However, a spokesman said Tuesday that Knowledge Universe Education had retained two investment banks to manage a private placement. About half of the offering has been placed.

Milken, his brother Lowell and Steven Green, former U.S. ambassador to Singapore, are principals in the partnership, which “decided to diversify its ownership by a private offering to a few highly sophisticated international institutional investors,” spokesman Geoffrey Moore said.

The company, operating as Knowledge Learning Corp., runs about 2,000 early-childhood education centers, mostly under the KinderCare name. The company also provides before- and after-school tutoring programs and other educational services.

According to its website, KinderCare and Knowledge Learning serve more than 200,000 children in 39 states and the District of Columbia.

Read the full L.A. Times story

.(registration required)