Twenty years ago, Dr. Foster established Strategic Impact, Inc. as a national consulting firm that provides planning, evaluation, research services and grant writing to the nonprofit and public sectors. Her consulting practice improves nonprofit effectiveness by developing strategies that focus resources to further the nonprofit mission. Throughout her career as a management consultant, nonprofit executive and community planner, she has assisted a variety of organizations, including local government, neighborhood and community organizations, human services, animal welfare, the arts, and other nonprofit agencies. This work requires a broad array of skills, among which are verbal and written communication, conducting focus groups, problem solving and decision making, strategy formulation and implementation, qualitative and quantitative research and writing grants. As she works with an array of clients and project partners, she is adept at building consensus among diverse populations and stakeholders.
She earned a Ph.D. in Public Policy Analysis and Administration, with an emphasis on policy implementation and applied research from Saint Louis University. The education path continues into teaching as an adjunct professor at the University of Missouri – St. Louis where she teaches Nonprofit Leadership and Management. She taught a similar nonprofit leadership course at Southern Illinois University – Edwardsville in addition to a current health issues class where she co-taught and provided a health policy perspective. The greater part of her teaching experience has been in the Brown School of Social Work at Washington University where she teaches Social Policy Analysis and Evaluation.
