Jennie Joseph, a British-trained midwife and women’s health advocate, moved to the United States in 1989 and began a journey that has culminated in the formation of an innovative maternal child health care system, The JJ Way®.

Jennie has worked extensively in European hospitals, American birth centers, clinics, and home birth environments. Jennie has been instrumental in the regulation of Florida midwives since the 1990s and has been involved in midwifery education since 1995. She is a former Chair of Florida’s State Council of Licensed Midwives. Currently, she owns a Florida licensed midwifery school attached to her nationally-renowned birth center and maternity medical home in Winter Garden, Florida. She also developed and administers perinatal professional training and certification programs to address the health care provider shortage, diversify the maternal child health (MCH) workforce, and address persistent racial and class disparities in birth outcomes.

Due to the high prematurity rates experienced by low income and uninsured women, Jennie established an outreach clinic for pregnant women, who are at risk of not receiving prenatal care. Her ‘Easy Access’ Prenatal Care Clinics offer quality maternity care for all, regardless of their choice of delivery site or ability to pay and has successfully reduced both maternal and infant morbidity and mortality in Central Florida. There are both quantitative and qualitative studies underway regarding Jennie’s work as well as continuous reviews of the impact of her clinical and educational programs.

Jennie’s model of healthcare, The JJ Way®, provides an evidence-based system to deliver MCH services, which improve health, reduce costs, and produce better outcomes all round. As Founder and Executive Director of her own non-profit corporation, Commonsense Childbirth Inc., Jennie firmly believes that, “Everyone wants a healthy baby and every birthing person deserves one.”

Tara Dalles is a native Floridian passionate about coaching and supporting others to become the best versions of themselves. After receiving a Master’s degree in Health Service Administration from the University of Central Florida, she was able to use this passion at a local hospital system for 8 years where she refined her operational and regulatory skill set. 

After the birth of her each of her daughters, Tara was inspired to dive deeper into the birth community first by becoming a Certified Childbirth Consultant and ultimately to leave her career in the hospital system to pursue her passion for birth work.

This led Tara to work for Commonsense Childbirth School of Midwifery, initially as a contractor brought on to help the school attain its MEAC accreditation. Now as the Dean of the school, Tara seeks to use her organizational skills and mentor mentality to help our community thrive.

Nicole Lawrence is an Emerson College graduate with a degree in Writing and Communications. With 4 years of writing and tutoring experience, she is passionate about providing quality educational support, interpersonal connections, and fostering community wherever she goes.

Nicole has been involved in reproductive justice advocation for the past 5 years and recently gained certification as a Community Outreach Perinatal Educator to further support her efforts as a full spectrum reproductive rights activist. She is currently working towards a certification in herbalism, so she may further serve her community.

At CCSM, Nicole works closely with students in all aspects of their educational experience from the admissions process to being a Teacher’s Assistant. Through her work with CCSM, Nicole strives to further build upon the proactive and revolutionary environment at CCSM so that students gain the access, connections, knowledge, and empowerment they need to be successful midwives.

Carmen Mojica is an Afro-Dominicana, born and raised in the Bronx. She is a certified professional midwife, educator, writer, and reproductive justice activist with a particular focus on birth justice. She utilizes her experience as a midwife to raise awareness on maternal and infant health, highlighting the disparities in the healthcare system in the United States for Afro-descendant people. Carmen is one of the co-creators of Bronx (Re)Birth and Progress Collective, a group of Black mothers, doulas, and organizers who aim to build alternate solutions outside of the system that protect and honor birthing people in the Bronx and their families.

In August 2010 through a fellowship with Hudson Perinatal Consortium, Carmen became a certified birth doula. Graduating from Maternidad La Luz, a midwifery school and birth clinic in El Paso, Texas, Carmen attended over 90 births and provided prenatal and postpartum care in Spanish to mothers. As a doula, she has provided  mental, emotional, and spiritual support for women during and after the course of the pregnancy as well as providing additional support to the women’s family and friends.

Gabriella Gonzalez is a Cuban-American who was born and raised in a small town in South Florida. After high school, Gabriella wanted to find better opportunities to branch out into the unknown and wanted to pursue a career in the veterinary field.

Working with both animals and people for a better part of eight years, Gabriella saw an opportunity to work more people-based and understand the struggles and emotions of daily life and wanted a pursue a career in psychology.

Life had different plans while going through education and Gabriella birthed a baby girl while being a single mom. She started to acknowledge how important midwives and third-party advocacy were while struggling with daily life.

Through social media platforms, church gatherings, and several meet-up groups, Gabriella has broken a stigma about mental health and being a single mom, tolerating negativity and changing others’ perspectives on the supportive rights of others. She continues her education in the psychology field in hopes to continue breaking the cycle and shape the minds of future generations to come. 

Stephanie is a practicing midwife with licensure in both Colorado and Texas; she graduated with her Bachelor’s of Science in Midwifery from the Midwives College of Utah in 2021 and now sits on the clinical faculty teaching new students. She is a registered NARM preceptor with a passion to support students to become the best midwives they can be for their own communities. She currently resides in CO, where most of the year she enjoys spending time with her family, cycling with colleagues, and advocating all things reproductive justice and birth equity.

Justine Clegg has been active in maternal and child health since 1974 when she became a La Leche League Leader, then a childbirth educator, labor coach, and birth assistant.

She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Communications from the University of Miami, a 3-year Diploma from the South Florida School of Midwifery, and a Masters in Science degree in Counseling from Florida International University.

Justine is a home birth midwife licensed in Florida since 1986.

She is a Certified Professional Midwife through North American Registry of Midwives since 1993.

She is a Florida Licensed Mental Health Counselor since 1993. 

She became a Certified Lactation Counselor, Academy of Lactation Policy and Practice, since 2008.

She was Midwifery Program Director at Miami Dade Community College, Medical Center Campus,1994-2008, and received an Endowed Chair, 2003-2006.  

My name is Courtney Smith, I am a Licensed Midwife practicing in Washington State.  I am excited to have the opportunity to empower the next generation of midwives by creating an inclusive environment.  Our work as students and midwives is important and life-changing for families who encounter us.  

I was born in the panhandle of Idaho and have resided in Washington state for the last 28 years. I began my family very early in life and have been blessed with three outstanding children. In 2014, I graduated from Washington State University with a Bachelor of Arts in Social Science. My medical experience started in 2008 when I began working as a medical assistant with the University of Washington’s Department of Family Medicine. This work exposed me to a wide variety of people and their needs. I wanted to expand my scope of practice and was drawn to midwifery after attending my neighbor’s birth and the birth of my nephew. I was lucky enough to find obstetric training in my own backyard and completed my Master of Science in Midwifery with a Botanical Medicine focus at Bastyr University.

Thank you for inspiring me to do this work.

Courtney

Janell Moore (she/her) is a California Medical Board Licensed Midwife (LM) and a Certified Professional Midwife (CPM). She holds a Masters in Public Health (MPH) with a concentration in community health sciences. Her career in sexual and reproductive health spans over 16 year – from working as a medical assistant in free and low-cost community clinics to managing federally funded research and doctoral training programs. After earning her masters, Janell dedicated her career to working in epidemiology in HIV research and prevention, specifically among BIPOC and LGBTQI communities. She has worked with HIV-positive pregnant and lactating people in Uganda and the DR Congo as well as coordinated HIV research projects in Cambodia and the US. In 2018, she took a leave from academic research to attend the direct-entry midwifery program at Maternidad La Luz in El Paso, Texas. She is in now a home birth midwife in private practice in Los Angeles where she provides body positive, gender-affirming, trauma informed holistic care. As an instructor, Janell draws from the varied experiences of her students to encourage agency and communal ways of knowing in hopes of dismantling the divide between academia and the public. She is fluent in Spanish and enjoys traveling, reading, yoga and (novice) surfing.