New $6.5 Million Student Center Opens at Grace Community Church in Lakewood Ranch

Grace Community Church opened its new Barry Martin Student Center on Sept. 23, giving fourth through twelfth graders in Lakewood Ranch a dedicated two-story building of their own on the church's Lakewood Ranch Boulevard North campus.

The 15,000-square-foot building cost $6.5 million to build. It has room for about 300 students on each floor, and it's meant to serve the roughly 800 children and middle schoolers already coming through the church's youth programs each week. High school students are expected to start using the building in early October, once their programming moves in behind the younger grades.

The church, at 4080 Lakewood Ranch Blvd. N., has been growing for years alongside the surrounding neighborhoods. Middle schoolers got a preview of the new space at a first service held there on Sept. 5, ahead of the full opening later that month.

What it means for families

For now, the building is running on the church's regular schedule of services and youth programming. That changes by January, when church leaders plan to open the center on weekdays so students can drop in after school lets out, not just during scheduled church activities.

That's the detail most likely to matter to parents juggling pickup times and after-school care. A weekday drop-in option inside a purpose-built youth building, sized for 300 kids per floor, is a different scale of offering than a typical church youth room tucked into an existing building.

Part of a bigger campus expansion

The student center isn't a standalone project. It follows the church's broader campus expansion plan, which last year also included a 550-space overflow parking lot to handle growth in attendance across services. Together, the two projects point to a congregation that has been outgrowing its existing buildings and is now building for the crowd it already has, not just the one it hopes to get.

Church leaders have not said what comes next for the campus once the student center and overflow lot are both fully in use. For families weighing after-school options in Lakewood Ranch, the January launch of weekday drop-ins is the date to watch.

Got a tip or question about growth happening near you? Share it in the Community Forum, where neighbors are already talking about it. For more on what's opening and expanding around town, visit the Community and Education sections of the Lakewood Ranch Community Website.