Interim Superintendent For Boston Public Schools Laura Perille Seeking 'Balance' This School Year

BOSTON (CBS) -- Interim Superintendent for Boston Public Schools Laura Perille joined WBZ-TV for a live interview on Monday night ahead of the new school year. School in the city begins a week from Thursday.

Prior to her appointment, Perille was the CEO of Edvestors, a school improvement non-profit, for 16 years. While there, Perille and Edvestors took part in "everything from providing resources to foster innovation and solutions in problem solving right at the classroom level and school based level to major system level work on issues like middle grades math rigor, equitable assess to arts education for now 17,000 more students over the period that we worked on this."

Edvestors also awarded schools with $100,000 for "stories of real improvement inside the Boston Public Schools."

Many people have called Perille's appointment unorthodox because she has never been a teacher, a principal, or a superintendent nor does she hold a state license to run a school system.

Perille said her approach is what will make her a success. "One of the things that really matters, an approach that I'm trying to bring into central office is really looking at the central office as a support system to schools and school leaders. So it is first and foremost making sure that the voices of front line educators, the voices of the school leaders, and the staff who are closest to the work that actually touches our students and families is pulled forward and incorporated into how we make decisions and I think that is something my existing knowledge helps me to do."

Perille also said she has learned about the school system by being a mother to two students going through it.

After her appointment on July 2, Perille made it a mission to open schools on time and hit the ground running as to not lose time for the students. Her other main focus has been "getting this balance right between central office and schools. That speaks squarely to my prior experience."

The NAACP criticized the transparency of Perille's appointment because the choice was made between Boston Mayor Marty Walsh and the school committee. Perille did not say that she was immediately seeking to make her interim position a permanent one, though. Instead she wanted to focus on this school year.

Students at Boston Public Schools are 42 percent Hispanic, 34 percent black, 14 percent white, and 9 percent Asian. The staff is 61 percent white, 21 percent black, 11 percent Hispanic and 6 percent Asian. Making the staff more representative of the student body is a "priority" for Perille.

"I think that that is something that BPS has been working very hard on, we're continuing to work on... I think there is also a question of, BPS has created incredibly diverse pipeline programs because one of the challenges nationally as well as locally, students in our teacher preparation programs are also not producing the diversity of pipeline that we need. So Boston has been making great strides in building its own pipeline programs," said Perille.

For back to school tips from Boston Public Schools, visit their website.