Birth Worker Trainings
As a team of experienced birth workers, it is our privilege to share that knowledge and experience with you. DC Birth Doulas offers a shadow doula program for new and prospective doulas, Lamaze childbirth educator training seminars, and special birth related workshops throughout the year. We are helping to build a more vibrant birth community for our birthing families, one birth worker at a time.
Shadow Doula Program
Are you prepared to accept your first client as a newly trained doula? Are you wondering if doula work is for you? Do you still have a full-time job, and you’re trying to figure out how to attend a birth?
Before you start accepting clients of your own, shadow an experienced doula for your first births.
Build your confidence to support families by first becoming familiar and comfortable with the sights, sounds, and vocabulary surrounding birth.
Become familiar with the hospital room, including the standard machines, monitors, supplies available, and how to work together with the staff.
Watch an experienced doula work within the Doula Scope of Practice, including how to enhance communication between clients and providers, provide support for different types of births, and recognize and respect professional boundaries.
Fee $200 per birth.
Lamaze Childbirth Educator Training
Building strong and healthy families through access to accurate, evidence-based, health-justice informed reproductive health educators.
The Community Birth Educators program uses a blended learning format, which allows you to start the 20-hr program requirements online prior to the in-person classroom portion. The online portion of the program must be completed before the seminar. The second portion of the training is a 2-day interactive classroom-based seminar.
Seminar Fee: $500
Program Requirements
Community Birth Educators welcomes all potential participants regardless of religion, color, or orientation. This program is great for individuals with both clinical and non-clinical health backgrounds. The seminar will build on your maternal health knowledge by adding evidence-based information, principles of adult education, basic business and marketing skills, and interactive teaching strategies. After the seminar, participants will be able to offer engaging, transformative, evidence-based birth education to meet the needs of their community.
The following are required for completion of the program:
- Complete online assignments prior to your scheduled seminar.
- Attend and fully participate in the 2 day in-person training seminar.
- Prepare and present a 5-10 minute teaching presentation during the seminar.
- Observe at least one birth. An alternative for participants with L&D or RN experience is to complete a journaling/reflection assignment.
- Observe a childbirth class taught by a certified Lamaze educator.
Lamaze Educator Training Scholarships
Community Birth Educators is committed to providing access to education, training, and support for educators from all communities, especially from traditionally under-served or under-represented populations. A limited number of scholarships are available for priority communities, including indigenous, Spanish-speaking, and participants from LGBTQIA+ communities and communities of color.
Program Trainers
Sarah Paksima
Program Director, MPH, MBA, LCCE
Sarah (she/her) has trained Lamaze educators all over the world. Drawing on years of teaching experience and…
Sujata Gami
Program Trainer, MS, LCCE
Sujata (she/her) has a welath of experience teaching and training L&D nurses for Kaiser in Sacramento, CA…
Rena Geibel
Program Trainer, MPH, LCCE
Rena’s (she/her) birth of two girls in Kenya in 2004 and 2005 influenced her to shift her professional focus …
