Photo courtesy Lifetouch
Robbie Teel
Robbie Teel
Community schools are defined as public schools that directly cater to the needs of families that they serve. According to the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) website, there are currently 16 community schools in Milwaukee, serving over 7,000 students in the city. These schools partner with different local organizations in order to accommodate students in creative and innovative ways. As a community school coordinator, Robbie Teel embraces the notion that community and education work are inseparable.
“A lot of people think of us as a bridge to resources,” Teel explains about his role. “The majority of what I do is systems development, to make schools equitable places where we’re elevating the voices of students and families.”
Born and raised in upstate New York, Robbie Teel grew up in a small working-class community that he looks back in hindsight as under-resourced. “There was a culture of failure in the school system,” he elaborates. “I was one of very few kids from my graduating class that went to college.”
Community Building
Repulsed by the inequities he saw in his hometown, Teel developed a spirit for justice, peace and community-building from a young age. He arrived in Milwaukee in 2015 when he took a job working at a school on the city’s South Side. “I worked with 7th graders, and a lot of kids had behavior issues,” Teel continues. “I fell in love with that class. A lot of them just needed a new chance and have someone advocate for them.”
Since 2023, Teel has been a community school coordinator at a public elementary school in Milwaukee, overseeing the transformational work happening in regard to community partnerships and public education. His vision favors a horizontal decision-making process that incorporates community and student input into all levels of decision-making rather than enforcing excessive top-down power dynamics.
When he first came into the role, Teel saw traditional models of schooling failing. Many kids could not read at their grade level, they were not being represented in the materials they received, and traumatized families were not being heard by their districts.
Assessing Needs
“There was a lot of finger pointing,” Teel recalls. “I almost saw separate schools in one, where there was the bilingual side and the monolingual side, there was a racial divide between the Black and Latino populations, and just a huge culture of distrust that permeated communitywide.”
Once Teel and his colleagues assessed the needs of their school, they highlighted two primary areas of focus—safety and wellness. Subsequently, through their community partnerships, the school was able to bring in air quality monitors, healthcare providers, dentists and vision testing for students. “Every single kid got dental care for free,” Teel confirms. “Some of them had never been to a dentist before. It’s not a thing people all have access to.”
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Teel oversees a “walking school bus” program and backpack provision for his students as well. The school also partnered with housing agencies. “A lot of our families are first-generation immigrants, and I connect them with resources to help them during a crisis,” Teel adds. “We’re always pivoting and changing and evolving our process as the needs arise.”
Planning Activities
Some of Teel’s students recently helped plan children’s activities for the Dia de los Muertos event at Forest Home Cemetery. Other students had the opportunity to do restorative justice training with the Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin.
“These kids are capable of doing incredible things if they’re given a chance and a seat at the table,” Teel attests. “School is a social place; it’s not just a place where you go to learn. It’s a place where you meet your friends and develop relationships.”
Teel’s hope is that these practices and ideas can help shift the cultural mindset around school into a more empowering one where the joy of learning is redefined and reclaimed. He so far has heard positive feedback from students, parents and faculty alike.
He concludes with a call to action, “Go into your local school, see what they need and what is it you can offer. Can you cook? Do you want to teach kids how to dance? Are you an artist? Can you have hot chocolate ready for the kids when they get to school with the walking school bus? You don’t have to do it in the traditional, limiting way that maybe we view schools. It’s not just learning—it’s community building.”
