Evansville Christian School embarks on expansion following enrollment surge
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Evansville Christian School is investing $4.25 million to build a high school addition as part of a strategic plan to move students across the system closer together.
The elementary school built in 2021 and the high school built in 2016 are neighbors on the corner of Outer Lincoln Ave. and Epworth Rd. in Newburgh. Students also attend preschool and pre-K at the nearby Crossroads Christian Church. However, the middle school is three miles away on Cullen Ave. in Evansville.
ECS Superintendent Mike Allen said the high school’s eight-classroom expansion expected to be finished in July is phase one of a vision to bring middle school students to the Newburgh campus.
“We are currently in a place where we have two freestanding buildings because over the last 10 years, our school has grown nearly 80%,” he said. “This phase would be the first connection that would then continue east on the line so we can build a high school, and we’ll end up with a 7-12 building rather than just 9-12.”
In addition, ECS is celebrating a record enrollment of more than 1,100 students this school year and its 50th anniversary. Commemorative events include inviting alumni to a “Blue and White Night” varsity baseball game at Bosse Field on April 4.
“We’re collecting as many stories as we can of people who’ve been involved [with ECS] from the beginning. We still have a gentleman on our board who is of the founding family,” said Allen.
ECS growth
ECS was founded as an open enrollment and interdenominational Christian school with more than 140 students in K-6 grades.
“Birthed in 1975 out of Bethel Church and intentionally not called Bethel Christian School because the vision was for our area to have a Christian school that was open and welcome to the community,” Allen said. “We have gone through so many iterations of kindergarten through 8, then kindergarten through 12. We had a high school that ended up having to close in 1991.”
In 2020, ECS broke ground on the new elementary school and held its first high school graduation in nearly 30 years.
“We had an eighth-grade class of probably 60 or 70, and we had 10 who decided to start with us on that first relaunch of the high school in 2016,” said Allen. “They called themselves: the class with vision.”
In 2025, around 80 students will be in the incoming freshman class, according to ECS High School Principal Brooke West. She said the annual “tidal wave” of students from the lower grades was a primary factor in this year’s expansion.
“Every year, the high school grows by about 30 students because we have larger classes coming up, and we want to be ready for them,” West said.
Development vision
ECS, which is accredited by the State of Indiana and the Association of Christian Schools International, relied on private donations to fund the high school classroom addition.
“We have a great base of very committed people to Christian education. We built $25 million worth of buildings in the last six or seven years,” said Allen. “We have people in the community that have to see this finished, and they’re making it happen, and it’s incredible.“
The two-story expansion is under construction off the south side of the high school on Epworth Rd.
“We have a whole block of classrooms, then we have our gym, and attached to the other wall of that gym, we’ll have this other bank of eight classrooms,” Allen said.
In the future, the idea is to upgrade the addition into another facility so that ECS 7th and 8th graders can move from Cullen Ave. to the high school campus.
“[The expansion] is the first wing of classes that we would like to use to build a new high school development that’s connected to our current high school building, which would then, Lord willing, become our middle school,” said Allen.
The strategic plan also includes exploring ideas for dedicated athletics and fine arts facilities. Allen said the school is pursuing partnerships to share local auditoriums and searching for green spaces near the Newburgh campus.
“Our fine arts and athletics are the areas that we have had to play a little bit of the long game in and be creative with because we’ve had such rapid growth in enrollment that we have to put our dollars towards making sure that our athletics and fine arts programs can even exist,” he said.
‘It’s energizing’
Salas O’Brien and Evansville-based Traylor Bros., Inc.—the companies that built elementary and high schools for ECS—are working on the classroom expansion. West also plans to add faculty for the next school year.
“We add faculty every year as we restructure to figure out how to best meet the needs of students,” she said. “And we’re getting people in some brand new rooms. So it’s pretty fantastic.”
Since the new high school is in the idea stage, there are no immediate plans for the project, according to Allen.
“We have done nothing towards it except pray about it and dream and build this current expansion project in line with where we know we want it to be. The only thing we know is we want it in this area on our property. The next step is where we work with a consulting firm. Within the next year or two, we’ll do a feasibility study and planning session,” he said.
Allen said he’s excited about the growth of ECS in recent years and seeing how the school prospers in the next 10 years.
“It’s cool. It’s scary. It’s energizing,” he said. “The people that God has brought along to work towards this work and the way he’s grown our staff to be able to manage all of this has just been something. When you have the right people around, and you like each other, you can do a lot of hard things. And that’s the mantra that we go by,” he said.