St. Luke School operates on the campus of St. Luke United Methodist Church in downtown Columbus. Our campus is only blocks away from Columbus State University’s downtown riverfront campus, the RiverCenter for the Performing Arts, the CSU Coca Cola Space Science Center, the Muscogee County Government Center, the Columbus Riverwalk, the Springer Opera House, and many downtown businesses, law offices and financial institutions. The school is organized into 48 classrooms that hold classes in five buildings, including the main school building (referred to as the 318 building), the Middle School, St. Luke Church, the Ministry Center, and the Early Learning Center (ELC). Each building has an office with school personnel in a leadership position.
The 318 building is the remodeled Columbus High School building originally built in 1898, and the anchor of St. Luke School’s vibrant downtown campus. That building houses the school office, the Head of School office, the Elementary Media Center, a computer lab, first grade classrooms, and second grade classrooms. Eleven classrooms – including Junior Kindergarten, third grade, and fourth grade – are located in the St. Luke Church building. The St. Luke Ministry Center houses all fifth grade classrooms, as well as a gymnasium that is used for PE classes, pep rallies, sports events and more. The ELC is the site of Kindergarten and Junior Kindergarten classes. Above those classrooms is our Innovation Station with Music, Drama, Spanish and Art classrooms, as well as our Junior Kindergarten through fourth grade STEAM Lab and our Broadcast room. The Middle School building holds all sixth, seventh, and eighth grade classrooms – there are four for each grade – as well as the Middle School Media Center, a second art classroom and the fifth through eighth grade STEAM Lab.
St. Luke School is fortunate to have two playgrounds on campus for our students to enjoy. One is behind the 318 building and another is behind the Ministry Center. Stockwell Hall cafeteria in the Church building is where our students are served a hot lunch each day. There are two automated Media Centers on our campus, which include over 11,000 print volumes. All classrooms are equipped with an interactive whiteboard system (either SMARTBoards or Aquos Boards) and one teacher station. There is also a computer lab available on campus – we are down to one dedicated lab now that every Middle School student has a personal Chromebook – along with mobile labs of Chromebooks for our third, fourth, and fifth graders, and over 100 iPad and iPad Mini devices available for student and teacher use. Before and after school care for our students is provided by the St. Luke Early Learning Center.
Our downtown Columbus location gives our staff the opportunity to take students on a variety of walking field trips – whether to take in a play at the Springer Opera House, or to go on an architectural scavenger hunt in the Historic District as part of an Art elective. We also have an outdoor classroom that may be reserved by teachers. The configuration of our campus means that students are moving between buildings daily and crossing the street to do so. In order to ensure their safety, we have security guards stationed at the intersection of Third Avenue and Eleventh Street during the school day. All buildings on the St. Luke campus have secure entrances to further ensure the safety of our students and staff.