Our People
The Collaborative for Inclusive Education is an initiative of the NYC Charter School Center. The close and consistent collaboration between our teams ensures we’re able to maximize impact at all levels of support for schools – instruction, operations and policy and advocacy. The Collaborative team brings a unique perspective to the work, spending hundreds of hours in schools each year access and inclusion and cultivate promising practices.
Melissa Katz, Vice President
With over 15 years experience championing inclusive practices and addressing systemic barriers for historically marginalized populations, Melissa is the Charter Center’s VP of Inclusive Education and Director of the Collaborative for Inclusive Education. Melissa leads the Collaborative team in providing charter schools with the guidance, trainings, resources and technical assistance necessary to serve all students. She also engages in special education and MLL/ELL citywide coalition work, serves as the sector’s voice on NYC Public Schools’ advisory councils and working groups, and represents NYC at the national level. Through her work, Melissa seeks to break down silos and build bridges in order to achieve educational equity for all students. Melissa holds BAs in French, Spanish and English, as well as Master’s in TESOL and Educational Leadership. Reach out to Melissa at mkatz@nyccharterschools.org.
Angelica (Angie) Maddox, Inclusive Education Program Manager
Through her role as an Inclusive Education Program Manager, Angie partners with educators and leadership teams to build systems, strengthen culture and implement concrete, day-to-day practices that better support students with disabilities. Her work sits at the intersection of coaching, strategy and implementation, often adapting to what each school needs rather than fitting into one fixed role. As a former special education teacher of multiple content areas and a dean of special education, she brings practical experience to her work. Angie holds a BA in American History and an MS in Special Education with a concentration in History. Reach out to Angie at amaddox@nyccharterschools.org.
Eleanora (Ellie) Grose, Inclusive Education Program Manager
Before joining the Collaborative as an Inclusive Education Program Manager, Ellie spent more than two decades supporting special populations – including students with disabilities, multilingual learners, and at-risk youth – as a teacher, coordinator and director at charter schools across the country. Her work focuses on the intersection between learning, family systems and inclusive practices. Ellie works closely with charter schools to create and maintain programs that support all students. Ellie holds a BA in Psychology and an MS in Special Education. Reach out to Ellie at egrose@nyccharterschools.org.
Kimberly (Kiki) Almonte, Senior Administrative Coordinator
Kiki oversees the Collaborative’s membership management infrastructure, event operations, social media, and much more. Kiki is the Collaborative’s Senior Administrative Coordinator, building and managing the logistical systems behind the team’s work. Her vital contributions form the backbone of the Collaborative’s day-to-day operations while ensuring that charter schools have access to resources that support their ability to serve diverse populations. Kiki holds a BA in History. Reach out to Kiki at kalmonte@nyccharterschools.org.
Renee Minnocci, MLLL/ELL Program Manager
As the Collaborative’s Multilingual Learner Program Manager, Rene is committed to advancing linguistic equity and amplifying the voices of bilingual students and families across New York City. Through coaching, professional development workshops, classroom observations, and strategic planning, she partners with school teams to build culturally responsive environments where multilingual learners are valued and supported. Rene holds an MA in Bilingual and Bicultural Education and a BA in Spanish Language and Literature, bringing deep expertise in dismantling barriers for diverse learners, including bilingual and autistic students. Reach out to Rene at rminnocci@nyccharterschools.org.
Emary Aronson
Board Chairperson & Founding Board Member
Robin Hood Foundation
Chief Knowledge Officer & Senior Advisor to the CEO
Emary Aronson is the Chief Knowledge Officer and Senior Advisor to the CEO at the Robin Hood Foundation. She oversees Robin Hood’s special initiatives including Blue Ridge Labs, the Capital Grants Initiative, Mobility LABs, and the Robin Hood Learning + Technology Fund, as well as the activations of Robin Hood’s Relief Fund.
Prior to joining Robin Hood, Emary taught history and economics at the college level before becoming the Director of Education Initiatives at the New York City Partnership and Chamber of Commerce, where she helped develop a $29 million education reform program. Emary holds a BA in History from Smith College, an MSc in Economic History from the London School of Economics, an MPPM from the Yale School of Management, and a PhD in History from the University of Chicago.
Phoebe Boyer
President and Chief Executive Officer, Children’s Aid
Founding Board Member
Since being selected as its president and chief executive officer in 2014, Phoebe Boyer has worked to strengthen Children’s Aid’s programs and operations with a keen focus on optimizing the impact on the lives of children, youth, and families. Under her leadership, Children’s Aid was recognized as a 2017 winner of the New York Community Trust’s Nonprofit Excellence Awards, while Phoebe herself was honored by City & State on its 2018 Above & Beyond list of 30 remarkable women and its 2019 Responsible 100 list of people who are improving their communities and making transformative change.
Before joining Children’s Aid, Phoebe spent more than a decade at the Robertson Foundation, where she oversaw operations and grantmaking of more than $100 million annually. During her tenure, she developed and executed the foundation’s national K-12 education reform strategy. She also served for 12 years as the executive director of the Tiger Foundation, raising more than $200 million to support their mission of breaking the cycle of poverty in New York City.
Phoebe graduated from Wesleyan University, on whose board she serves, and earned her MBA from Columbia Business School. She also serves on the board of Independent Sector and is also an inaugural member of the Pahara Aspen Education Fellowship.
Geoffrey Canada
President
Harlem Children’s Zone
Geoffrey Canada is renowned for his pioneering work helping children and families, and as a thought leader and passionate advocate for education reform across the country. Despite growing up in the deeply devastated community of the South Bronx, he achieved great academic success, receiving a bachelor’s degree from Bowdoin College and a master’s degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. After graduating, Canada created the Harlem Children’s Zone, a birth-through-college network of programs that today serves more than 13,000 low-income students and families in a 97-block area of Central Harlem in New York City.
The unprecedented success of the Harlem Children’s Zone has attracted the attention of the media and leaders around the world. Canada was named one of the world’s most influential people by Time magazine in 2011 and as one of the 50 greatest leaders by Fortune magazine in 2014. President Barack Obama created the Promise Neighborhoods Initiative to replicate the Harlem Children’s Zone model across the country. Canada has published essays in The New York Times, The New York Daily News, and The Chronicle of Philanthropy as well as two critically acclaimed books on poverty and violence: Fist Stick Knife Gun and Reaching Up for Manhood.
After 30 years with the Harlem Children’s Zone, Canada stepped down as Chief Executive Officer in 2014, but continues to serve as President. In 2020, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, Canada founded The William Julius Wilson Institute (WJW), which serves as the national platform to help communities impacted by poverty across the country design and implement their own place-based programs.
Cecily M. Carson
President
Carson Family Charitable Trust
Cecily M. Carson is president of the Carson Family Charitable Trust. She is also a trustee of the Fisher House Foundation; a director of the Excellence Girls and Excellence Boys Charter Schools of Bedford-Stuyvesant; vice chair of the Robin Hood Foundation’s Board of Trustees and chair of the Robin Hood Foundation’s Leadership Council; and a member of the President’s Leadership Council at Dartmouth College, the Advisory Board for Columbia School of Business’s Social Enterprise Program, and the NY Public Library’s Library Council.
A native New Yorker, Cecily graduated from Dartmouth College in 1995 with degrees in Government, Film, and Women’s Studies. She spent two years at Andrew Edson & Associates, Inc., a corporate and financial public and investor relations firm in New York, before studying for two years in the Fashion Institute of Technology’s (FIT) Jewelry Design program and starting CMC Jewelry Designs, Inc., an independent jewelry design business.
Mark Dunetz
President
New Visions for Public Schools
Mark Dunetz began his career as an educator teaching English as a second language and social studies in New York City public schools. In the two decades since, Dr. Dunetz has worked as a program evaluator, an educational consultant, and a professor of research methods and educational administration. He first joined New Visions for Public Schools in 2006, when he supported the implementation of the organization’s first certification program for aspiring school administrators. While at New Visions, Dr. Dunetz also led the design of the first public high school to provide pathways to students from underrepresented communities into well-paid “below the line” careers in New York City’s television and film industry. Dr. Dunetz served as the founding principal of the Academy for Careers in Television and Film from 2008 until 2013 as it developed into one of the city’s most academically successful non-selective high schools.
In 2013, Dr. Dunetz returned to New Visions as Vice President for School Support and Operations, leading a significant expansion of the organization’s data and analytics capacity, the launch of a software development team, and the creation of open source high school curriculum in core subjects. In 2016, he was selected to replace Robert L. Hughes as the president of New Visions.
Dr. Dunetz holds a BA in U.S. History from the University of California, Santa Cruz; an MA in Teaching Speakers of Other Languages from New York University; and a Ph.D. in Urban Education with a concentration in education policy from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.
Spencer Robertson
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
PAVE Schools, Representative of the Robertson Foundation
Spencer Robertson is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of PAVE Academy Charter School in Red Hook. Before launching PAVE, Mr. Robertson worked at North Star Academy Charter School of Newark. Mr. Robertson completed the Building Excellent Schools Fellowship, which provided him one year to study the highest performing public schools in America. His education career includes three years as a seventh and eighth grade language arts and Spanish teacher and co-founder of the school’s running club. He then served as a program officer at the Tiger Foundation, supporting after-school programs and early child development initiatives throughout New York City.
Mr. Robertson holds an MBA from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business with a focus on the non-profit sector and B.A. in English from Duke University. He lives in Brooklyn with his wife and four children.
Basil Smikle
Professor of Practice and Director of the M.S. in Nonprofit Management program
Columbia University School of Professional Studies
Dr. Basil Smikle Jr. is a Distinguished Lecturer and Director of the Public Policy Program at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College. He also lectures at Columbia University in the School of International and Public Affairs and Teachers College. With over 15 years in higher education and 25 years of a career dedicated to public service, Basil regularly shares insights on electoral politics, governance, and public policy on national media outlets such as MSNBC, CNN and Bloomberg TV.
He holds a PhD in Politics and Education and an MPA from Columbia University and received a Bachelor of Science from Cornell University. Previously, Basil served as the Distinguished Lecturer of Politics and Public Policy at the City University of New York’s School of Labor and Urban Studies. He was appointed by former Governor David Paterson to serve as the Executive Director of the New York State Democratic Party during the 2016 presidential cycle where he was the “second highest ranking Democrat” in the State.
Basil worked closely with elected officials and community leaders to manage electoral and fundraising strategies for the State. He recruited candidates for political office and worked closely with the Democratic National Committee to create grassroots mobilization programs and act as a Party surrogate. Under Basil’s leadership, Democrats flipped county legislatures, and county-wide seats – laying the foundation for returning the State Senate to full Democratic control in 2018 and flipping three Congressional seats. He received awards from the Governor and Comptroller of New York State for his commitment to public service and education equity.
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