Seattle private school purchases site for expansion in Rainier Beach

Cristo Rey Jesuit Seattle High School on Friday purchased about half of the 6-acre St. Paul Church campus, where the school currently operates, from the Catholic Church, President Paul Hogan confirmed to the Business Journal.

The land includes space for the school’s new 21,000-square-foot building at 10001 57th Ave. S. The Norcliffe Academic Center is scheduled to break ground in mid-September. It also includes a rectory and a convent that the school is using as office space.

Under a deal negotiated with the Archdiocese of Seattle and approved by the Vatican, the school has the option of acquiring most of the rest of the St. Paul campus for another $3.4 million, said Hogan.

The $7 million price tag for the entire property is a discount from an appraised value of $11.6 million due to the school’s service-oriented mission, he said.

Cristo Rey’s Seattle campus opened two years ago and is “in a period of major growth,” Hogan said. The Norcliffe building will help the school expand from 163 to 400 students by the time it opens in the summer of 2027, he said.

Private donations, including a “major gift” from the Norcliffe Foundation, funded the $15 million building, Hogan said.

Public47 Architects is the designer and Bellingham-based Exxel Pacific is the general contractor.

The Seattle school is part of a network of 42 Cristo Rey institutions nationwide. The school only serves students from the lowest economic quartile “who would not otherwise be able to access private or Catholic education,” Hogan said.

Families pay sliding-scale tuition, between $40 and $250 per month. The school is known for its work-study program, in which students spend one day a week working at a local company through all four years of high school. Corporate work-study partners include major employers like Microsoft, Paccar and Costco.

Cristo Rey currently leases classroom space at the former St. Paul School building, which closed in 2021. Last week, Cristo Rey completed a $2 million renovation of the 70-year-old school building. It intends to eventually purchase the property along with the rest of the campus.

“Our hope and dream would be to purchase the entire campus except for the church (which is operated by South Seattle Parish),” said Hogan.