The Cultivating Community Together Project (CCT) focuses on contributing to urban school and community development in the city of Philadelphia through collaborative research and action by teams made up of educators, students, and families of the School District of Philadelphia and faculty and students at Swarthmore College. CCT is a study of community and school partnerships in Philadelphia schools past and present that focuses on story gathering through interviews, writing, archival research and oral histories. We use a culturally affirming and liberatory approach that is focused on working alongside Philadelphians in order to center their lives and experiences in educational policy and action. By doing collaborative research and examining various models of community and school partnerships and the history of Black and other People of Color-led education movements in Philadelphia, our goal is to document and share powerful practices of cultivating community to strengthen the educational experiences for all students, families and educators in Philadelphia today and into the future.