Eckerd College Photo Tour

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Eckerd College

Eckerd College Entrance
Eckerd College Entrance. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Eckerd College is a selective, private liberal arts college located on a waterfront campus in St. Petersburg, Florida. The college's location complements its popular programs in marine science and environmental studies, and Eckerd's strengths in the liberal arts and sciences earned it a chapter of the prestigious Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society. The school was also featured in Loren Pope's Colleges That Change Lives. It should be no surprise that Eckerd made my list of Top Florida Colleges.

I shot the 16 photos in this tour during a visit in May of 2010.

You can learn more about costs and what it takes to get admitted in these articles:

Continue the photo tour by using the "Next" button below.

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Franklin Templeton Building at Eckerd College

Franklin Templeton Building at Eckerd College
Franklin Templeton Building at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

All Eckerd students quickly become familiar with this large and attractive building near the entrance to campus. The Franklin Templeton Building is one of the campus's primary administrative buildings and is home to the financial aid office, business office, and, of particular interest to prospective students, the admissions office.

The second floor is home to the state-of-the-art Rahall Communication Lab.

If you're exploring Eckerd's campus, be sure to head up the stairs to the second story balcony. You'll be rewarded with excellent views of campus lawns and buildings.

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Seibert Humanities Building at Eckerd College

Seibert Humanities Building at Eckerd College
Seibert Humanities Building at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

The Seibert Humanities Building, as its name suggests, is home to the humanities programs at Eckerd College. So if you plan to study American Studies, Anthropology, Chinese, Classical Humanities, Comparative Literature, East Asian Studies, History, International Business, Literature, Philosophy, or Religious Studies, you'll quickly become familiar with this building.

The building is also home to the college's Writing Center and the Office of International Education and Off Campus Programs. Only a small handful of colleges in the United States have a higher level of participation in study abroad than Eckerd.

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Armacost Library at Eckerd College

Armacost Library at Eckerd College
Armacost Library at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

The location of the Armacost Library was chosen carefully -- it sits by a small lake at the crossroads of the academic and residential sides of campus. Students have easy access to the library's 170,000 print titles, 15,000 periodicals, and numerous study rooms whether they are coming from their classrooms or dorm rooms.

ITS, Information Technology Services, is also housed in the library, as is the Academic Resource Center which provides a space for training and experimenting with multimedia equipment for classroom use.

Completed in 2005, the library is one of the newest structures on campus.

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Visual Arts Center at Eckerd College

Visual Arts Center at Eckerd College
Visual Arts Center at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

The Ransom Visual Arts Center at Eckerd supports the college's visual arts faculty and majors. Students at Eckerd can work with media such as painting, photography, ceramics, printmaking, drawing, video and digital arts. Although Eckerd may be best known for its environmental science and marine science programs, the arts are also popular with about 50 majors attending the college at any given time.

The end of the academic year is a great time to see the talent of Eckerd's art students -- all seniors need to present a body of work in the Elliott Gallery.

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Galbraith Marine Science Lab at Eckerd College

Marine Science Lab at Eckerd College
Marine Science Lab at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Marine science and environmental science are two of the most popular majors at Eckerd College, and the Galbraith Marine Science Laboratory is one of the facilities supporting research in these fields. The building sits on the waterfront on the south end of campus, and water from Tampa Bay is continuously pumped through the building for use in studying the ocean's plant and animal life in various lab and aquarium facilities.

Students interested in studying marine biology will find few colleges with a location so well suited for the field, and with an entirely undergraduate focus, Eckerd provides students with lots of opportunities for hands-on research and field work.

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South Beach at Eckerd College

South Beach at Eckerd College
South Beach at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Eckerd's waterfront real estate has advantages that go well beyond the classroom. Right next to the Marine Science Lab is South Beach. This area of campus offers sand volleyball courts, a pavilion, a soccer field, and, of course, the white sand beach you see in the photo above. In May, the soccer field is taken over by a large tent for graduation.

A couple mangrove islands can be seen from the beach, and students often explore the Pinellas National Wildlife Refuge and Bird Sanctuary by kayak.

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Wildlife at Eckerd College

Wildlife at Eckerd College
Wildlife at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Eckerd may be located in a heavily developed part of Florida, but the waterfront location on the tip of the St. Petersburg peninsula means you'll find no shortage of fauna and flora. Ibis, heron, parakeets, spoonbills, storks, and parakeets frequent the campus. During my visit, this brown pelican was hanging out on the dock by the boathouse.

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Green Space at Eckerd College

Green Space at Eckerd College
Green Space at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

I visited about 15 campuses during my tour of Florida colleges, and Eckerd's was unquestionably one of my favorites. It's an attractive campus that makes excellent use of its waterfront location. The school's 188 acres are well landscaped with lots of green space -- trees, lawns, lakes, coves, and beaches. It's a campus worth exploring even if college isn't in your future.

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Wireman Chapel at Eckerd College

Wireman Chapel at Eckerd College
Wireman Chapel at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Eckerd College is affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA), but students have diverse beliefs. The Wireman Chapel is at the heart of spiritual life on the campus. Catholic students can attend Mass and confession, and the college also offers non-denominational Christian services. Student groups include Hillel and Orthodox Christian Fellowship. Moreover, the college's location gives students access to Hindu, Buddhist, Islamic and other religious communities in the Tampa and St. Petersburg area.

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Wallace Boathouse at Eckerd College

Wallace Boathouse at Eckerd College
Wallace Boathouse at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Few colleges in the United States provide students such ready access to the water. All students have the opportunity to check out kayaks, canoes, sailboats, sail boards, and fishing equipment. Serious students can get involved with EC-SAR, Eckerd's marine rescue group. Some boats in Eckerd's fleet are used for marine science research and class field work. Students can also explore the nearby mangrove islands by kayak.

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Brown Hall at Eckerd College

Brown Hall at Eckerd College
Brown Hall at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Pictured here is the outside of the 24-hour coffee house in Brown Hall.

Brown Hall stands at the heart of student life at Eckerd College. Along with the coffee house, the building is home to The Triton (Eckerd's campus newspaper), the school radio station, and the offices for housing and residence life, service learning, and student affairs. The great majority of campus activities and organizations are anchored in Brown Hall.

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Iota Complex at Eckerd College

Iota Complex at Eckerd College
Iota Complex at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Opened in 2007, the Iota Complex is the newest of Eckerd College's residential complexes. The building was constructed with sustainability in mind, and the landscaping highlights native plants and uses reclaimed water for irrigation.

Like many of Eckerd's housing complexes, Iota is made up of four "houses" (Byars house is featured in the photo above). The Iota Complex has 52 double occupancy rooms and 41 singles. The complex has two kitchenettes and two laundry rooms, and each of the four houses has a couple lounge areas.

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Omega Complex at Eckerd College

Omega Complex at Eckerd College
Omega Complex at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Built in 1999, the three-story Omega Complex houses juniors and seniors at Eckerd College. The building has 33 four- or five-person suites configured in a variety of single-occupancy and double-occupancy rooms. Each suite has two bathrooms and a fully equipped kitchen. From the balconies of Omega Complex, students have great views of the campus and bay.

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Gamma Complex at Eckerd College

Gamma Complex at Eckerd College
Gamma Complex at Eckerd College. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

Gamma Complex is one of the traditional housing options at Eckerd College. All first-year students at Eckerd live in one of the traditional housing complexes -- Alpha, Beta, Delta, Epsilon, Gamma, Iota, Kappa or Zeta. Each of the complexes is made up of four "houses," and many of the houses have themes. Students can live in a house with students who share similar interests such as community service or the environment, or they can choose a "pet house" and bring fluffy to college with them. Eckerd also offers several all-female houses.

Each house has 34 to 36 students, and most are co-ed by floor. You can view more photos (Flickr).

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Graduation Tent at Eckerd College

Eckerd College Graduation Tent
Eckerd College Graduation Tent. Photo Credit: Allen Grove

When I arrived at Eckerd College in May, students were busy packing up for the summer and the graduation tent was set up on the soccer field by South Beach. It's a stunning location for concluding your four years of college.

According to the National Center for Educational Statistics, for students who began their studies in 2004, 63% graduated in four years and 66% graduated in six years.

To learn more about Eckerd College, follow these links:

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Grove, Allen. "Eckerd College Photo Tour." ThoughtCo, Aug. 27, 2020, thoughtco.com/eckerd-college-photo-tour-788544. Grove, Allen. (2020, August 27). Eckerd College Photo Tour. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/eckerd-college-photo-tour-788544 Grove, Allen. "Eckerd College Photo Tour." ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/eckerd-college-photo-tour-788544 (accessed March 29, 2024).