Memphis Grizzlies Preparatory Charter School is in its 15th year, but it’s going through changes.
The school, supported by the Memphis Grizzlies Foundation, is entering a new era — it recently added a new school for girls and it’s the school’s first year in its new building on Corry Road in South Memphis after the school moved from its Jefferson Avenue location.
Grizzlies Prep describes itself as “an unusual model for how a professional sports organization can invest in education,” and is the only NBA-backed school in the United States.
The school recently added a new STEAM middle school for girls, where students learn science, technology, engineering, art and math — “art” is more about reading, literacy and comprehension, said Tim Ware, Grizzlies
Prep Executive Director, who joined the school in 2020.
The school currently supports 6-8th grade for boys and a 6th grade for girls, but the school hopes to expand to offer more grades for girls.
There are 310 students in the boys school and 70 in the girls school, and the boys and girls are kept completely separate, Ware said.
High-performing academics is central to the school’s pitch, Ware said.
“We meet all students where they are and we grow them exceptionally well,” he said.
The partnership with the Memphis Grizzlies goes beyond branding. The school gets support from the Memphis Grizzlies Foundation, which provides financial support, runs mentorship programs, a lunch buddies program and a “Memphis Grizzlies Scholars Program” for academically advanced students.
Several former Grizzlies players have visited the school or contributed to it in some way, Ware said. Derek Rose has visited the school. Xavier Tillman used to sponsor a school field trip each year and would show up and talk to the kids. Desmond Bane was the school’s graduation speaker one year.
Jahmai Mashack, drafted by the Houston Rockets in 2025 and traded to the Grizzlies, donated $1,000 to support student incentives ― students can earn “buckets” (positive points) or “turnovers” (negative points) and can spend their points at a school store that includes chips, candy and Grizz merchandise.
A work in progress
The building holds some remnants of the school that preceded Grizzlies Prep. Text on the gym floor still claims the territory for the Corry Eagles, a previous school’s mascot, and some of the hallway floors are still orange. But most of the school’s walls have been painted blue since Grizzlies Prep took over the building on June 1.
“We had a good team that was working on it,” said Larry Granderson, the school’s facilities manager, who started working with the school over the summer.
Ware said the Grizzlies Foundation and the FedExForum Arena Operations team is planning to help the school rebrand the gym.
The library is also a work in progress — books are stacked on tabletops and on rolling carts — but that hasn’t stopped students from using it. It’s a pretty busy space, said school librarian Jane Oliver, who is in her fifth year at the school.
“We average between 90 and 100 on any given day that come in and out,” she said. “A whole homeroom of girls comes every day at lunch.”
A renovation of the library should be complete this fall, Ware said.
The school has some work to do. The gym has no HVAC and the building’s electrical system has an end-of-life date of 1998, Ware said. But Ware is looking forward to the growth that the school will experience.
“We’ll start our next chapter here,” Ware said. “It’ll be three years of change.”
Jack Armstrong covers breaking news and the environment for The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at jack.armstrong@commercialappeal.com and followed on X @jca2902.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Memphis Grizzlies Prep has a new building and a new school for girls
