Meet Our Team
These dedicated folks continue to work diligently to further expand our circle of compassion.

Courtney Perez, Interim Director
Courtney has 20+ years of experience working in the financial services industry.  She has held a wide variety of roles including leading large diverse teams, developing and executing large-scale employee engagement strategies, leading and managing business controls for high-risk processes, and project management responsibilities.  She studied Business Management at Florida Atlantic University.   
In early 2016, she was unexpectedly inspired by a social media post to transition to a vegan lifestyle.  This lead her Full Circle Farm Sanctuary were she leads the Outreach and Education Department, including Business and Programs Management responsibilities.  She is currently serving as the Interim Director of Full Circle Farm Sanctuary.
Courtney is originally from the greater Boston area and now lives north of Atlanta with her husband and dogs Bambi, Benny, and Roscoe. 
Kayla Swope, Animal Care Manager
Kayla joined the Full Circle team in 2017, and has 10+ years of animal care experience. She grew up in State College, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Shippensburg University in 2013 with a degree in Elementary Education. After graduating, she decided to pursue her passion in caring for animals. As a child, she fell in love with pigs, and made the connection that you don't eat something you love. This caused her to stop eating pigs, and gradually other animals. After learning more about farm animals, she became vegan in 2011. She began fostering and bottle feeding kittens at a young age, and in 2014 began working at Centre County PAWS, a dog and cat rescue. She continued fostering cats and dogs. Knowing farm animals were among the most exploited animals, she wanted more experience helping them, so she took an internship at Animal Place in 2016, where she learned how much she loved caring for farm animals. This led her to start working at Full Circle Farm Sanctuary.
Kayla currently resides in Opelika, Alabama with her fiancé Spencer, dog Bentlee, and pig Nora. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, camping, mountain biking, reading, and listening to podcasts.
Carley Pasquale, Lead Animal Caregiver
Carley is originally from Western Pennsylvania and moved to Georgia to join the Full Circle Farm Sanctuary team! She has loved animals since she was very young. Her cat, Hyde, was her inspiration to save animals. Though Hyde wasn't the friendliest cat to most, he immediately became her best friend. Hyde showed her that all animals are worth saving no matter the personality and no matter the species!
Carley’s animal experience ranges from amphibians to sea lions; she spent a long time learning veterinary skills at a mobile vet clinic for cats and dogs, and worked with wildlife rehabilitation. She is especially interested in enrichment activities for animals.  Joining the Full Circle team made her dream of working with farmed animals come true
Emma Fobean, Animal Caregiver
Emma is originally from Northeast Ohio.  She has a B.A. in Interdisciplinary Creative Writing, Visual Art, and Language from Stonehill College.  She volunteered frequently with farm animal sanctuaries beginning in 2013, and has been vegan since 2011. She values ensuring that every resident is content and fulfilled in their forever home at Full Circle Farm Sanctuary. She enjoys reading and appreciating the vibrant sunsets at the sanctuary.
Riki Higgins, Education and Outreach Coordinator
Riki is the Education & Outreach Coordinator at Full Circle, and a former educator with a bachelor's and master's in Special Education. Riki went vegan in 2011 after betting their friend they could do it for a month - and never stopped! From there, they volunteered in animal rights work frequently, both organizing vigils and protests, and shifts at local animal sanctuaries. They founded the Knoxville, TN chapter of the Animal Save movement and helped found what would later become Scruffy City Veg Fest - Knoxville's first Veg Fest. Eventually they left teaching to pursue animal rights work full-time, and joined the care team at Full Circle. After serving on the care team for two years, Riki transitioned to assisting with social media, education, tours, and other efforts by Full Circle to share a message of animal rights with the world at large.
Currently Riki lives in Warm Springs with their roommates Hadley, a great dane, and Fred, a chinchilla. 
Erin Tompkins, Animal Caregiver & Graphic Designer
Erin has worked at Full Circle Farm Sanctuary since February 2018.  She has been vegan for 12 years, and has enjoyed a lifelong passion for animals.  She is now dedicated to helping Full Circle promote animal rights.  She is a graduate of Auburn University's Animal Science program, and has witnessed the animal ag industry from the inside.  Erin worked at Zoo Atlanta for several years, then moved on for ethical reasons.  From her education and work experience, she brings knowledge of positive reinforcement communication and enrichment techniques.  In addition to animal care, Erin works as Graphic Designer, creating sanctuary merchandise designs and images for various campaigns.  Always for the animals!