Downtown is home to 12 daycare and early education facilities, including: Foreign Language Immersion Center, which offers bilingual education for children under the age of five, Downtown Elementary School that will open this fall to accommodate 750 K-6 grade students, Memphis Academy of Science and Engineering, a new charter school opening this fall for grades 7-12 that will specialize in biosciences, and Maria Montessori School in Harbor Town offering an alternative to traditional education for students in grades K-8.

Top-notch education continues at the CBID's schools of higher learning, including: University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Southern College of Optometry, Methodist University Hospital, Baptist College of Health Sciences, Southwest Tennessee Community College, University of Tennessee College of Social Work, and several nursing schools.

Downtown also has the Cossitt Memphis/Shelby County Public Library which opened in 1888 as the first public library in Memphis. The library holds the Memphis and Shelby County Archives and a gallery showcasing works from instructors and students of the Memphis College of Art.