Founder of Dialogue Fosters — educator and advocate for equality and inclusion across the North East.
Founder & DirectorElias Sahardid is an educator, storyteller and advocate for equality and inclusion across the North East of England, drawing on his own lived experience of forced displacement.
He is the founder of Dialogue Fosters, a storytelling, EDI and mediation social enterprise, and of RAI Academy, an accredited online training provider built to narrow the gap between refugees and the UK labour market. Through both, Elias brings people together through conversation and education, with a particular commitment to supporting people seeking sanctuary.
For more than five years he has designed and delivered anti-racism, human-rights and conflict-mediation training for schools, organisations and communities — holding space for difficult, honest conversations on race, migration, gender and belonging.
Elias is a UK for UNHCR Storyteller, sharing lived-experience perspectives in national conversations on displacement and belonging, and an Independent Scrutiny Board member overseeing Northumbria Police on matters of race and inequality. He holds an MA in International Relations, Conflict and Security and a BSc in Sociology (Gender and Inequality).
Bring our team’s experience to your school, workplace or community — through training, conversation and lived-experience education.
Empowering understanding through storytelling, education, and inclusion.