Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has visited to Newark, the city where he said he would donate $100 million (£63 million) worth of his company's stock over the next five years.

Appearing with Newark Mayor Corey Booker and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on Saturday, he said the first step of the process would be getting community input on the changes that need to be made.

Recounting how his grandmother had been a teacher and his parents had worked hard to give him and his three sisters a good education, Mr Zuckerberg said he hoped to do the same, not just for thousands of Newark students, but to help create a new model for successful public education that could be replicated across the US.

He dismissed questions about the timing of his donation, which coincides with the release of a movie about Facebook that portrays him in a less than flattering light.

"This (donation) is something that's going to play out for years," he said.

The three players seeking to turn the windfall into a renaissance - a 26-year-old internet whizzkid, a Democratic mayor described by Oprah Winfrey as a "rock star" and a Republican governor drawing criticism and acclaim for his budget-slashing ways - announced their plans on Friday on Winfrey's talk show.

Mr Christie said he would give Booker a major role in overseeing any major changes in the district, which the state took over in 1995 because of persistently low test scores and wasteful spending.

Mr Booker pledged to raise an additional $150 million (£94.57 million) for the effort.

"What's the alternative? Is it to continue what we're doing now, with nearly a 50% drop-out rate?" Christie said. "I'm much more willing to take risks and take chances when it comes to this."

New Jersey's Supreme Court has found in rulings over the past two decades that urban schools were underfunded and ordered the government to fund the most impoverished districts as well as its most affluent suburban schools. The court has also pushed the state to spend billions to upgrade school buildings in cities and provide free pre-school education for three and four-year-olds.

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