Incoming Schools Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos ran the public school system’s response to the migrant crisis, helping schools figure out how to serve more than 40,000 recently arrived children living in homeless shelters. It taught her a lot about leading a team.

“Top-down leadership doesn’t really work. And so when you are one person among a team of extremely talented people coordinating closely with everyone and keeping everyone focused on the priorities and the deliverables and holding ourselves accountable, that’s what a leader does,” Aviles-Ramos said during a sit-down interview with NY1 education reporter Jillian Jorgensen.

Aviles-Ramos will be putting those leadership skills to work as the next chancellor of New York City public schools, assuming Mayor Eric Adams remains in office through January 1, when she is set to take over for outgoing Chancellor David Banks. She said she and Banks work closely together already, and are focused on a smooth transition.

“I’m confident these next three months will be productive, they will be busy, they will be exciting. And I think they’re going to be great,” she said.

Maybe too exciting: Mayor Adams is facing a federal indictment on charges including bribery. Asked about that, Aviles-Ramos pivoted to her focus on the school system. 

She’d take charge as the city is continuing to implement a new reading curriculum. In the first year of the roll-out, reading scores fell at schools using the new approach.

“Offering a curriculum citywide is one step in a very long process that we’ve committed to when it comes to New York City Reads. And part of that process also includes the interventions and the supports that students get when they might be stumbling along the way with the curriculum,” she said.

Aviles-Ramos, who has served as a teacher, principal, and interim superintendent in city schools, will also be tasked with managing systemic problems that long predate this administration, like the city’s struggle to provide services to children with disabilities. She cited improvements and said doing more is important.

“As an English teacher, I taught many students with IEPs, and so I understand at the teacher-level what it means when a student has an IEP and when they don’t have the services, what that, how that manifests for them in the classroom,” she said.

And, she’ll be overseeing a system grappling with cell phones. She said they should not be out in the classroom, but is not rushing toward a citywide ban. 

“I completely agree with Mayor Adams in that a concept and an idea can be amazing, but implementation is where it’s at,” she said. “And as a principal who did collect cell phones, I was mandated to collect cell phones. And sure, there were some benefits. There were also some challenges. And every school is very has a very different feel. They have different challenges.”

Aviles-Ramos — who currently leads the division tasked with community and family engagement — said talking to schools and families will be key in this decision, and in all of her work as chancellor.