Tom Gill (LC 2021, CEF 2010, CLI 2009)
President, Urban Community School
Tom Gill is the President of Urban Community School in Cleveland, Ohio. Gill has served UCS since 2010, as the Development Director (2010-2012), Chief Operating and Development Officer (2012-2015), and Associate Director (2015-2017). He became President in July 2017.
During Gill’s time at Urban Community School, the school has grown from 400 to nearly 750 students, and along the way has forged many partnerships to benefit UCS students and families. The UCS campus is home to MetroHealth’s Ohio City Health Center that currently serves 100,000 patient visits annually. The building also includes a Legal Aid office, Foodbank Pharmacy, and a WIC office while offering primary care and behavioral health services to UCS students, families, and the surrounding community.
The UCS campus is also home to The Gallagher Family Early Education Center which serves 120 infants, toddlers, and preschool children year-round.
In 2017, USA Lacrosse out of Baltimore chose UCS as a site for its “Lacrosse Communities Project,” building a youth-sized field at the school that offers lacrosse programming in collaboration with Cleveland State University and Near West Recreation. In 2018, Gill also helped drive a partnership with Urban Squash Cleveland which opened a Youth Development Center on the UCS campus. Urban Squash Cleveland is part of a national network of youth squash programs called Squash and Education Alliance.
Along with the many other partnerships of UCS, Gill has spearheaded critical collaborations with Facing History and Ourselves and The Refugee Response. Each of the organization’s headquarters are now on campus and opened in spring 2022. The UCS campus also includes two House of Champions homes, which is an afterschool program offering youth high-quality programming, meals, homework support, and recreation until 8:00pm Monday-Friday.
Previously, Gill was a Cleveland Executive Fellow at the Cleveland Leadership Center where he went through four rotations including Cleveland Metropolitan School District, The Cleveland Indians, Cuyahoga County Land Bank, and St. Martin de Porres High School. He also served as a Community Coordinator for the Casa de la Solidaridad at the Jesuit University of Central America in San Salvador, El Salvador from 2005-2007.
In addition to his work at the school, Gill also chaired the Board of Neighborhood Family Practice, a federally qualified health center, and currently serves on boards of The Refugee Response, Beaumont School, the Greater Cleveland Sports Hall of Fame and two committees of The Greater Cleveland Foodbank.
Gill grew up in Bay Village, Ohio, and attended Saint Ignatius High School. He earned a Master’s degree in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and a BA from Saint Louis University.
Gill currently resides in Ohio City with his wife Erika McLaughlin and their two young sons, Andrew and Patrick.