Savannah Christian Preparatory School

In January of 1951, several visionary Savannahians asked God to confirm the idea of starting a Christian school on Savannah's Union Rescue Mission farm property on the outskirts of town. The group specifically prayed for gifts totaling $10,000 for that purpose by the end of the month.

With only $8,500 pledged at 3 p.m. on January 31, 1951, Union Rescue Mission workers in downtown Savannah began praying earnestly. Within a couple of hours - without knowledge of the amount needed and without being asked - one of Savannah’s leading businessman pledged $1,500 to help start the school.

Just as the flame above passes from one racer's torch to another, our Generation to Generation campaign signifies the passing of more than fifty years of amazing SCPS education and influence to current and future generations who will race with the SCPS flame for the next fifty years

The purpose of our Generation to Generation Capital Campaign is to redevelop our existing 254-acre Chatham Parkway campus for educational and co-curricular excellence, cost-effectiveness and managed growth. We refer to it as the “One Campus Plan” because we plan to eventually close our DeRenne campus and consolidate all of our students and programs on the Chatham Parkway campus.

Proposed plans include building a new Upper School, Upper School athletic and fine arts facilities, Lower School wing, Day Care, maintenance building and administrative offices and technical center on the Chatham Parkway campus. We also propose to complete the campus perimeter road, expand the cafeteria, build new Middle School and Upper School athletic fields and tennis courts, expand parking and in due time close the DeRenne campus completely.

Anticipated costs - including design and construction fees and furnishings - total more than $30,000,000. Projects are tentatively divided into seven phases. Project funding will come from a combination of charitable gifts and borrowed funds. We anticipate relocating the DeRenne campus students to Chatham Parkway when we are able to offer replacement and improved facilities and fields on the Chatham Parkway campus to all of our DeRenne campus students, possibly 5 –7 years.

The Board of Trustees voted in January 2003 to move ahead with project Phases One and Two, which total around $8,000,000. The Board retained the fundraising consulting services of the J. F. Smith Group, Inc. the company that assisted us in our feasibility study in the Fall of 2001.

We officially launched our Generation to Generation Capital Campaign in April 2003. We raised our first $1,000,000 by October 2003, raised a second $1,000,000 in January 2004, and reached our initial goal $3,000,000 in March 2004.

Additionally, the Board voted to refrain from marketing the DeRenne campus until we have a more clear occupancy timeline for potential buyers. We were approached in the early 2003 with an offer of $2 million and a demand for occupancy by summer of 2003. However, with a DeRenne campus appraisal of $3.2 million and no buildings on Chatham Parkway to move DeRenne students into yet, we did not seriously consider the offer. Other potential buyers have expressed interest since then, so we believe a good market for the DeRenne Campus will continue to exist.