About Me

Hi! I’m Kayla Foster, an Afro-Caribbean facilitator, restorative justice practitioner, human-centered designer, and innovator for liberation and flourishing.

I’m on a mission to cultivate spaces of imagination, connection, possibility, and impact! My work is rooted in building social connection through storytelling and restorative practices to weave the fabric of a world of wellness, liberation, and joy.

While consistently grounded in justice and equity, I work on cross-sectoral issue areas including public health, youth & community development, economic justice, climate, the criminal legal system, gender based violence, leadership for social change, and impact investing. I intentionally collaborate with individuals, organizations, and systems to build bridges between ideas and impact, harnessing actionable insights, shared vision, and skilled strategy to serve human & planetary flourishing and social transformation.

While my commitment to social change has been a lifelong calling, my dedication to addressing the injustice manifest in the criminal legal system began in 2019 as a tutor with the Petey Greene Program (PGP). As a PGP tutor, I went into local jails in Maryland and DC to provide tutoring services to support the educational goals of incarcerated learners. Since then, I have dedicated my career to leveraging a strengths-based approach to empower communities and provide off-ramps to the traditional criminal legal system. I have worked in community justice centers in New York City to design and facilitate diversion programs, host community activations and events, and optimize processes for effective service delivery. As a restorative justice practitioner, I create containers for healing to begin, facilitating restorative justice alternatives to incarceration and diversion programs, including cases involving serious injury, loss of life, traffic violence, and drug selling. I sit with people in some of life’s most challenging moments and walk with them on their journey towards something better.

I graduated from New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, where I earned a Master of Public Administration in Public and Nonprofit Management and Policy. During my time, I focused my studies on social impact, innovation, and investment, while also honing in on transformative leadership and management principles. I served as a co-chair of the Social Innovation and Investment Alliance and was a Graduate Investment Associate in the NYU Impact Investment Fund. Through my cross-sectoral and innovative approach to social change while at NYU Wagner, I was selected for the Social Impact, Innovation, & Investment Scholarship, the Ellen Schall Experience Fellowship, and the Jo Ivy Bufford Award for Innovation.

During my time at the University of Maryland-College Park, I earned a Bachelor of Science in Public Health Science, a minor in Sustainability Studies, and an Honors Citation from the Gemstone Honors program. My work at the University of Maryland was honored through my receipt of the Kirwan Leadership Award and the Kehoe-Kesler Award, and I was selected as a member of the Maryland Medallion Society and as a Senior Marshal.

My work has received international recognition, including being named a Dalai Lama Fellow, a Center for Expanding Leadership & Opportunity (CELO) Youth Service Fellow, a CELO Impact Fellow, a Mind and Life Summer Research Institute Emerging Leader, a BREATHE Collective Peacekeep(H)er Justice Fellow, and a Parayma Fellow.

In my free time, I enjoy hikes and picnics with my friends and dog Kylo, running through the streets of Brooklyn, practicing yoga and meditation, journaling, curling up with a good book, and, a recent new hobby, handbuilding and wheel throwing pottery.

In all that I do, I seek to honor the individual while spotlighting the interconnectedness of our experiences to move society towards a more equitable world in which people care deeply about each other and utilize empathy, compassion, and accountability to address harms and find healing at the individual, community, and societal levels.