Gulf Shores Opens New $137 Million High School After Nearly Six Years in the Making

GULF SHORES, Ala. — Gulf Shores City Schools officially unveiled its new high school Monday, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Susan and Gayland McCollough Performing Arts and Sports Concourse that drew more than 700 attendees.

Students began classes at the new campus Wednesday. The project took nearly six years from initial concept to completion and carries a price tag that district officials have cited at roughly $137 million to $150 million.

The 287,000-square-foot campus can accommodate up to 2,000 students, with about 1,000 expected to enroll for the inaugural year — well above the roughly 900-student capacity of the old campus.

“We finally have a facility that matches our mission,” said Gulf Shores City School Board President Kevin Corcoran.

That mission, according to Superintendent Matt Akin, is to give nearly a thousand high schoolers not just an education but a direction. “Let’s give students an opportunity,” Akin said. “How do you do that? By doing things differently and innovating.”

The building was designed around an unusually wide range of specialized programs. “Aviation to zoology, oyster harvesting, scuba diving, hydroponics agriculture, you name it, we do it right here, and we fly airplanes by the way too,” Corcoran said. Other offerings include culinary arts, robotics, performing arts, gaming and music, along with hydroponic vegetable gardens that supply the school cafeteria.

How the “forever school” came together

The idea for a new Gulf Shores High School traces back to 2015, when a group of parents and community members approached now-school board president Kevin Corcoran about splitting from Baldwin County Public Schools to launch the city’s own school district. Their philosophy from the start was academics first, facilities second.

The 200-acre site north of the Intracoastal Waterway, along the Foley Beach Express, came together through a land donation from Gulf Shores Mayor Robert Craft and his family, made before Craft became mayor. The city later purchased an adjoining 120 acres.

Craft said the family originally hoped the land would be used for either a school or a medical facility. “We were thinking high school or hospital. The evolution got us to high school first,” he said.

“It takes years, it takes commitment, and it takes continuation from one elected group to the next,” Craft said, noting the school board that took office in 2008 — five election cycles ago — has stayed united behind the project. “But it takes a long time, and it takes continuous passion.”

Crews broke ground in April 2024, driving more than 1,800 pilings into the subsurface before construction could begin.

Two names appear on three of the new campus buildings: Dr. E. Gaylon McCollough, a local plastic surgeon and former All-American football player, and his wife, Susan, a lifelong artist and arts supporter, were honored with the naming of the Fine Arts Center, Health Professions Center and Performing Arts and Sports Concourse in recognition of their gift to the school.

“Susan and I moved to Gulf Shores 27 years ago and quickly became aware of the educational, healthcare, creative and performing arts and athletic potentials of this community — just waiting to transition from dreams to realities,” McCollough said at the ribbon-cutting.

The senior class that just graduated from the old campus earned $61 million in scholarships — about $40 million more than the class before it, a jump school leaders point to as evidence the district’s academics-first approach is paying off.

“We dreamed big,” Craft said. “It took a long time to get here; it took a lot of money to get here. We were fortunate to have opportunities to raise the money to do this, and we’re going to make a difference for everyone in the city.”

Inside the new campus

The new school features 28 classrooms, 11 collaborative flex spaces, six science labs, a media center with a maker space and video production studio in place of a traditional library, and “The Sandbar,” a central gathering space in place of a traditional cafeteria. It also includes a 753-seat performing arts center, a covered outdoor practice field and a separate athletics and NJROTC wing.

Expanded space means the culinary and robotics programs, which had to turn students away last year, can now accept more of them. Local chef Jonathan Kastner teaches full-time in the school’s new kitchen, while other students are learning from Austral USA to help build U.S. Navy submarines, working toward scuba certification, or training on the navigation systems of a plane they built themselves.

Students who watched the building rise from the ground said the finished product exceeded their expectations.

“I’m going to be the first one to graduate, and I thought that is so cool,” said senior Addison Cosci. “I could never even think of this. This is way beyond what I could have imagined.”

A junior said the campus reflects the range of students it now serves: “There’s so many different types of students at this school. … There’s so many different things that interest our students,” and praised how the school addresses each specialty.

Another student pointed to the open architectural design — “Everything’s open,” and “You can see everything about every classroom” — while a third called the experience “surreal,” comparing it to something out of a movie or video game.

Even younger students in the district are looking ahead to enrolling. “I’ll be here in a couple years, so I’m very excited for that,” said sixth grader Liliana Sumerlin.

Corcoran said the school was built with long-term relevance in mind, with programs spanning “from aviation to zoology,” predicting the building “will be relevant decades and decades from now.”

Doors open at 7:30 a.m. for students, and the district is offering public “Tuesday Tours” of the new campus on Aug. 11, 18 and 25.

About the district

Gulf Shores City Schools formally began operating in 2019, taking over the city’s schools from Baldwin County Public Schools after an agreement between the city and the county system. It was the first city district to separate from the Baldwin County system; Orange Beach followed with its own district in 2022.