Kyle Layne-Allen is one of the new additions to the Abington Friends School teaching staff. The Boston native graduated from Colby College—whose football team he played for—with an English degree in 2013. He went to graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania, getting a master’s degree in Science of Education in 2019.
Layne-Allen formerly worked at Worcester Academy, his high school alma mater, Roxbury Latin Academy, and Westtown School. Layne-Allen moved to Philadelphia almost four years ago before starting at Westtown School. Outside the classroom, Kyle enjoys spending time at his local coffee shop, Alif Brew and Mini-Mart, hanging out with friends, going to Clark Park, cooking with his fiancee, and making music.
Though Layne-Allen has gone through many changes in his life, one of things that seems omnipresent in his adult life is music. A lifelong hip-hop enjoyer, Layne-Allen started rapping in college under the name Kizzo.
Layne-Allen said, “A bunch of [my friends] were relaxing, and an instrumental came on.” An instrumental refers to a song with no lyrics, or a beat.
“A friend of mine… started rapping. Then I started rapping, and then we just went in a circle… and the rest is history.”
Now making music under the name Teacher Kyle, he is most recently featured on Mancala, a song by Bille on the album Epistles II, produced by Grand Choice Records.
Speaking about his style, Layne-Allen said, “I love wordplay and entendre. Trying to code and disguise what [I’m] saying. Make it… a little bit inaccessible to the masses in order for them to make sense of it in the conscious.”
Layne-Allen referenced rappers like Lupe Fiasco, known for songs such as “Superstar” and “The Show Goes On,” and MF Doom, whose hits include “Rapp Snitch Knishes” and “Doomsday,” as inspiration. MF Doom is also known for wearing a mask almost everywhere.
Layne-Allen references what he calls “masking,” explaining that it is more than just facial obstruction. “Masking is a huge part of what we (rappers) do… When we deal with rap as a genre, we deal with this idea of persona play. [Rappers] are putting on personas,… and wearing their egos, or their vulnerabilities, through the lyrics that they write.”
Layne-Allen finds ways to incorporate these themes into his classes. In The American Short Story, a class taught by Layne-Allen, one of the readings is a short story called “The Minister’s Black Veil,” by Nathaniel Hawthorne.
“I wanted [the class]… to think about this veil, as not just a garment, but what it might represent in the story and about society… [MF Doom] is wearing a mask to highlight some of his pains…One idea you can take away [from “The Minister’s Black Veil”] is what it means to carry pain…, and how grieving is something that people might have to go through in order to grow.”
Layne-Allen said that MF Doom uses his mask to heal, grieve, and redefine himself, similar to the minister in “The Minister’s Black Veil.”
One of the most common comparisons to rap is poetry. “Poetry and rap… both play on rhyme, rhythm, pacing, and tone very well,” said Jarius Ford ‘26, who took Layne-Allen’s Reading and Writing Creative Non-Fiction class in the first semester.
Ford said, “The only difference is that rap [has] a beat to it. Rap has evolved into not necessarily being about the words, but more so about the beat and the vibe.”
Layne-Allen talked of his own experience with rap and poetry. “[Rap] informed the poetry I was writing in [my college classes], but the poetry gave me form for the song writing.”
That form is something that Layne-Allen spoke passionately about. “I do this thing called top-lining, humming words over a beat… so I can fill in the syllables and write the lyrics later. Top-lining is a practice used by many musicians and singers, including artists like Rihanna.
Layne-Allen has been rapping for more than 10 years now, and he said that it has taught him a lot. One of the biggest lessons was style, and how it is natural to change over time. He has gone through phases of a pop style of rap, a style more focused on pleasing others, and many more. But now, Layne-Allen says he is focused on what gratifies himself.
“Ultimately, [I’m trying] to find out who [I] am through this. If [I’m] trying to appease people, [I’m] changing my craft, but not for ways that appease [me].”
Layne-Allen said that rapping brings up a lot of questions for him. “How am I reaching a final form with my values? How am I expressing stuff that I want people to be proud of?”
But, he says, those questions lead him to find himself. “[I’m] not just doing this for an audience, but actually aligning with my spirit, and trying to [show] that for others as a model.”
John Breen • May 5, 2026 at 2:46 pm
It’s really cool to learn about Kyle’s passion for rap and what meaning it has for him. I don’t have Kyle as a teacher, but I’ve interacted with him and I’ve he’s always seemed pretty cool to me. I’ve only interacted with him during conscious communities, so what I’ve heard from his has mostly been on more serious school related topics or on topics that were discussed more between the students than the adults, so I didn’t know him very well at all. It’s nice to have a new perspective on who he is and it’s inspiring to know how passionate he is and what meaning he has found in rap and how he uses it to find himself
E'vah • Apr 26, 2026 at 11:32 pm
Rap and poetry are synonymous. Many of the poets I looked up to as a kid, and even now, are rappers, especially from the rise of hip-hop. When starting my journey as a poet, I took inspiration from music. I’d listen to tracks on repeat to create a world for my writing. I never grew out of it; I continue the same technique years later: listen to the song and write, listen again and write.
Music and poetry go hand in hand. Sometimes it creates rap; other times, it creates art that transcends genre. Forms of art like this are true soul-searching. You have to listen to yourself at times and remove yourself from the world at others. Poetry is a form that trains you and encourages you to be grounded.
It’s sick to know an educator at AFS dedicates himself to poetry in all its forms!