Bluff Park School

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This article is about the historical school. For the present institution, see Bluff Park Elementary School.

Bluff Park School, later Bluff Park Community School, Hoover Community Education, and Artists on the Bluff building, is a former school constructed in 1923 at 569 or 571 Park Avenue in Hoover's Bluff Park neighborhood. It replaced the older Summit School nearby.

Linda Williams was hired by the Jefferson County Board of Education in 1973 to superintend the Hoover Community Education program from Bluff Park School. The program offered classes in square dancing, interior design, flower arranging, computer literacy, and personal finance in the evening hours. She remained in that role as Hoover City Schools split away from the county system and developed evening programs at multiple locations.

The original school building was expanded to 32 classrooms in 1988.

In 1996 a new Bluff Park Elementary School was constructed just south of the existing campus. The older buildings remained in use for day care, community school programs, and community meetings. Hoover Community Education ended its operations at Bluff Park School when Williams retired in 2010. At that time, the former school building was in poor repair, with junk piled up in unused classrooms and sagging roofs.

In 2011 Williams and Rik Lazenby formed the non-profit Artists on the Bluff. The group negotiated an informal agreement with Hoover Mayor Tony Petelos and superintendent Andy Craig according to which the city would repair and maintain the building and provide a $50,000 annual allocation for three years. The school board continued to pay for utilities. Artists on the Bluff provided classes and programs and organized exhibitions. It also subleased 20 studio and gallery spaces to artists and gallerists. The renovated facility opened in September 2012. The organization flourished and served as a model for other publicly-supported arts programs.

The school's former cafetorium was used as a coffee shop. The Hoover Historical Society began keeping their archives in the former school library. The school continued hosting public meetings for the Hoover Art Alliance, Girl Scout Troop 30746 and other clubs.

In 2017 the school board determined that it could no longer subsidize the Artists on the Bluff by paying for utilities, which had sharply increased with the opening of the Capers on Park Avenue restaurant in 2015. Williams agreed that the non-profit should negotiate a fair lease. Within a few months, the school system determined that it could not afford to bring the building up to code nor to continue allowing it to be used without doing so. It agreed to lease the building to the City of Hoover if the city was willing to renovate it, but the Hoover City Council voted in September not to fund that work, thus requiring Artists on the Bluff and other tenants to move out. School board president Earl Cooper expected the superintendent to recommend razing the building.

In 2021 Hoover City Schools contracted for demolition of all of the former elementary school buildings except for the original 1923 schoolhouse. It was restored and reopened in 2021 as the home of the system's student services department.

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