Kristen Foster-Marks

Teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language

Minor in English

• Designs and develops scenario-based technical courses and workshops on cloud observability, software delivery, and product analytics
• Defines, monitors, analyzes, and reports on course success metrics
• Partners with engineering, product management, support, and product marketing teams to translate complex platform capabilities into practical learning experiences
• Leads curriculum strategy for Datadog’s Product Analytics suite
• Builds interactive learning environments and lab infrastructure that support scalable, reliable training experiences
• Applies learning science principles to improve training effectiveness and learner confidence
• Mentors teammates on technical content design, workshop development, and instructional quality standards while contributing to cross-functional curriculum planning

• Designed and conducted research on Developer Experience and software engineering productivity
• Thoughtfully selected research methods to gather developer feedback and translate findings into product and organizational recommendations
• Managed an internal program that equipped software engineers to write more effective technical articles

Developer Success Lab

• Collaborated on empirical research projects examining Developer Experience, team practices, and developer well-being
• Translated original research findings into educational materials, workshops, interventions, and curricula for software teams
• Designed learning experiences to promote evidence-based behavior change in workplace settings
• Led community programming that connected the lab’s research with practitioners through facilitated discussions, workshops, and other public-facing learning activities

• Designed and facilitated technical learning experiences on topics including software observability, web accessibility, and cloud computing
• Conducted needs analyses with engineering teams to identify strategic upskilling priorities
• Collaborated with subject matter experts to develop curricula aligned with organizational and technical initiatives
• Collected and analyzed learner and program data to evaluate effectiveness and improve future learning initiatives
• Regularly delivered internal talks and workshops on topics ranging from Rhetoric for Software Professionals to Gaining Confidence as a Speaker

• Developed customer-facing software features and mentored less-experienced software developers

• Led an engineering team responsible for customer-focused feature development, technical delivery, and team processes
• Coached six software engineers and three interns, emphasizing professional growth and continuous learning

• Developed internal APIs and software packages using Python, Django, Django REST Framework, and PyTest

• Led a software team developing, refactoring, and maintaining full-stack web applications

• Designed and delivered instruction in full-stack web development, including JavaScript, Node/Express, PostgreSQL, Angular, React, and Git

• Taught Academic Writing to native and non-native English speakers
• Designed, developed, and delivered curriculum for a variety of class types, learning objectives, and proficiency levels
• Conducted classroom-based research in beliefs about second language learning, applying findings to improve students’ learning
• Served as ESL Specialist in the CSU Writing Center, developing materials for ESL writers and training writing tutors to support non-native English speakers

• Taught English as a Foreign Language to elementary school children in an after-school program (hagwon)
• Trained and mentored new teachers
• Proposed, developed, and taught an original screenwriting course to the school’s honors-level writing students

• Taught English as a Foreign Language to elementary school children in an after-school program (hagwon)