On April 13, 2023, it was announced to the Penfield Montessori Academy (PMA) community that our school would be shut down at the end of the school year. On August 28, 2023, 90 of the 129 Penfield students walked through the doors of Collective Montessori School for the 23-24 school year. On September 3, 2025, Collective Montessori School will open as its own independent charter school, chartered through the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee (UWM)!

Since PMA was shut down, this community has accomplished the impossible. We opened our own school in under five months, we wrote and got our own charter under UWM approved, we grew enrollment from 100 students to 155 students, and we created and maintained a budget with no major donors that left us in the positive for two years in a row.

Our community has done incredible work to save this school. Every day we celebrate that the mission of providing a diverse and inclusive Montessori education to educationally disadvantaged children in Milwaukee still exists and is thriving!

Our children are smart, strong, kind and fierce protectors of what is right. They are well on their way to making the world a kinder, more inclusive, and empathetic place.

Cheers to Collective Montessori!

Team Members