MyVillage Project buys former Jacksonville elementary school to launch tech incubator and workforce hub (Courtesy of the Jacksonville Business Journal) — One of Jacksonville’s oldest schools, Annie R. Morgan Elementary, closed last summer, capping more than a century of service. Less than a year later, the building has a new owner who plans to spin the space into the city’s next tech incubator.
Jacksonville-based MyVillage Project, a statewide collective of grassroots organization founded in 2023, acquired the property in a $1.25 million deal approved by the Duval County School Board March 3.
MyVillage Founder Ronnie King’s first official day in the roughly 35,500-square-foot building at 764 Saint Clair St. was Tuesday. Working with its network of about 350 organizations in Florida, about half of which are in Jacksonville, the nonprofit is already busy.
The historic property’s full transition will take time and projected millions in investment — as much as $2.5 million, King told the Business Journal — but it’s an intentionally phased timeline that prioritizes immediate impact.
Northeast Florida’s innovation ecosystem has seen increased activity the last few years as various founders and organizations put time and capital into growing what’s available locally. The same is true for MyVillage, which King said operates where upskilling, education and technology meet.
“Every business, in a way in 2026, is a tech business,” he said. “On some level, very shortly, every business, if you’re going to be successful, you better be in the business of AI as well.”
That’s where the nonprofit, in some ways, hopes to fill a local need.
With initial operations underway, MyVillage’s focus is less on brick and mortar development as it is on activating the building as a functioning economic asset.
In the short term, the nonprofit aims to prioritize workspace for its existing programs, creating a centralized hub where student developers can collaborate directly with local clients in need of software development, AI tools and technical support.
The crux of that effort is through Coding in Color, a year-long program focused on students aged 16 to 21 who are passionate about computer science, delivering skills training, mentorship and entrepreneurship training.
The program was developed in partnership with the 100 Black Men of Jacksonville and the City of Jacksonville. It currently has 50 students, atop about 350 trained in years past, King said.
For now, the work shifts to execution.
“To have a city where a lot of small businesses have the tools and understand the ways to leverage technology in order to grow their business, I think that is when [Jacksonville] would truly be a thriving tech hub,” King said. “Our role is helping those small businesses do that.”
Over the next several months MyVillage will build out methodically, in tandem with other focuses, such as expanded robotics labs, video game design and AI training, shared meeting and classroom space, and more, King said.
Anchoring the incubator facet around workforce development and technology, MyVillage has positioned itself as connective tissue in Jacksonville’s young innovation sector.
To King, the goal isn’t just to teach technology, but give communities the tools to build what comes next.