Little is known about the kind of learning that occurs when teachers' professional development is situated at the intersection between university coursework, school practices and the lived realities of local communities. This study explores five years of data from a graduate seminar for inservice teachers, which examines how schools are situated within the larger social policy environment. Drawn from the coursework, surveys and interviews of eighty-five teachers working in sixteen school districts, the findings suggest that not only have teachers had few formal opportunities to learn about the impact of social policies on youth and families, but also that learning about these policies broadens teachers' organizational awareness, deepens their community connections and expands their professional network base. The findings point to the potential of designing post-licensure coursework in teacher education to both foster inter-professional collaboration and to broaden teachers' understanding of the relationship between social policy and school-community engagement.