Meet the Team

Brandon

Foster

Teaching & Learning Manager

Dr. Brandon J. Foster serves as the Teaching and Learning Manager at Black Men Teach. He leads BMT’s Leadership Coaches and Houses, and he guides the instructional growth of Teaching Fellows, student teachers, residents, and early-career educators from preparation into their first years in the classroom.

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Dr. Foster has worked in education across Indiana, Texas, Massachusetts, and Missouri as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, regional director of instructional coaching, district leader, and university lecturer. Most recently he was principal of Irwin Elementary School in Fort Wayne, a Title I STEM magnet school. Under his leadership the school reached 100% IREAD passage across every reported subgroup and posted double-digit ILEARN gains. He is also the founder of Foster Brilliance Educational Consulting and teaches Education and American Culture at Purdue University Fort Wayne.

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He is a first-generation college graduate and a proud product of Fort Wayne Community Schools. He holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Louisiana State University, master’s degrees from Indiana University Northwest and the University of North Texas, and a Doctor of Education Leadership (Ed.L.D.) from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

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6 QUESTIONS

WITH

Brandon

1 How would you describe what you do?

I serve as the day-to-day instructional leader for our Teaching Fellows, student teachers, residents, and early-career educators. I lead our Leadership Coaches and Houses, and my job is to make sure every Fellow has a coach, a community, and a clear plan for growth.

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Most of my work happens in classrooms and in conversation. I do observations, practice, and feedback aligned to the BMTenets. I lead professional learning like Teaching Fellowship Orientation and New Teacher Readiness. I partner with principals and supervising teachers so our Fellows are supported in their schools as well as by BMT. I also track what matters (instructional growth, licensure milestones, and retention) so we know our support is working. My goal is simple: help Black men enter the classroom prepared, stay in the classroom supported, and grow into the leaders our students deserve.

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2 What about the mission inspired you to join BMT?

I graduated from high school ranked 412 out of 437. That put me in the bottom 6% of my class. Nobody would have predicted a doctorate from Harvard. What changed my path was not a program. It was people who saw something in me before I could see it myself.

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As a student, I needed educators who believed in me. As a Black male student, I needed educators who looked like me and showed me what was possible. Black men make up a small share of the teaching workforce, and that gap is not an accident; it is the result of systems that were never designed with us in mind. BMT is building a different system. This mission is about more than putting Black men in classrooms. It is about giving every child, especially Black boys, a mirror and a window at the same time. I have spent my career trying to be that for students. Now I get to help build the pipeline that makes it possible at scale.

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3 If you could describe in one word why you work at BMT, what would it be?

Purpose

4 What is a piece of advice you would give to Black Men who are considering becoming teachers?

In this work, responsibility is easy to find. It shows up every morning in the faces of the students counting on you. Purpose is tougher to follow, because it asks you to keep choosing this work when the days are long and the progress is slow. The hardest thing to find is joy.

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Joy is what will sustain you. There will be hard seasons in the classroom and outside of it: a lesson that falls apart, a student you cannot seem to reach, a weight at home you carry into the building. In those moments, hold on to the promise: “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.”

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Hold on to your responsibility, follow your purpose, and protect your joy. Your students need all three, and so do you.

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5 What is the name of the teacher or teachers who had the most impact on you? Why?

I grew up in a single-parent household. When I was young, I heard Biggie say, “It was all a dream,” and it gave me permission to imagine a life bigger than my circumstances. That idea drives my work. I believe every child should have the academic ability to chase a dream big enough to discover a world they never knew existed, a world where they are exceptional.

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I am a systems builder at heart. My strengths are instructional coaching, school transformation, data-informed decision making, and building programs while they are still taking shape. I love origin stories, hip-hop, reading, writing, and the growing intersection of education and AI. Above all, I believe academic excellence is a path to freedom, for individuals and for whole communities.

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I am grateful to be here.

6 What else do you want the community to know about who you are, your passion for the work, and the skills you bring to the work?

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I am grateful to be here.

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1

How would you describe what you do?

1

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2

What about the mission inspired you to join BMT?

2 Purpose

3

If you could describe in one word why you work at BMT, what would it be?

3

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Hold on to your responsibility, follow your purpose, and protect your joy. Your students need all three, and so do you.

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4

What is a piece of advice you would give to Black Men who are considering becoming teachers?

4

Mr. Barnes and Mr. Thomas, two Black men who changed the direction of my life.

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Mr. Barnes was my health teacher, and he didn’t let me play around in his class. One day he gave me an ultimatum: either I behave and do what I’m supposed to do, or I won’t graduate. Nobody had ever drawn that line for me so clearly. He could have given up on me; instead, he told me the truth and held me to it. I have graduated four times since then, and the older I get, the more clearly I see what he did for me. Sometimes the most loving thing an educator can do is refuse to lower the bar.

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Mr. Thomas put me in an after-school program called Boys to Men, where our activities focused on our identity: who we were, where we came from, and who we could become. Mr. Barnes taught me accountability. Mr. Thomas taught me to know myself.

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I didn’t have the words for it then, but I know it now. I needed to see Black men who expected more of me and showed me what that looked like. That is exactly why I do this work at BMT.