Student Midwives are a vital part of the birth team.

At Gentle Beginnings, we believe in and support the apprenticeship model for the training of future midwives. We believe that midwifery is an ancient art and a "calling," not just another professional career choice. Classroom learning with only random clinical experience would not equip a student properly for relating to clients as individuals with individual and unique needs. Apprenticeship is the absolute best model when it comes to teaching continuity of care for clients. Students see clients from the beginning of their pregnancies, through their births and the postpartum period. They learn to care about the individual as an individual, and they learn to recognize first hand that what might be the "right" answer for one particular woman many not be the right answer for another.

At Gentle Beginnings we also require that our students enroll in a midwifery distance learning program or academic course. This combines the structure of academic learning with the apprenticeship model. We believe this is essential to a well-balanced education.

How Our Students Interact With Our Clients

At Gentle Beginnings we are very careful about whom we accept as a student into our apprenticeship program. It is very important to us that our students share our values and are compatible with our own personalities. For this reason, we hope that if you have hired us, you will also like our apprentices. But even though we are careful, we recognize that not every client will always be completely comfortable with every student. That is why we want our clients to know that they always come first with us. So we encourage our clients to fill out occasional evaluation forms for our students. This helps both the student and us know how they are doing and if they need improvement ...and if there are aspects of their skills and/or training that need improvement.

Students are always supervised and they are only allowed to do midwifery skills that they have been taught. We also only allow the students to interact with clients whom we believe are comfortable with the student. If at any time you do not feel comfortable with one of our students, please let us know. It is very important to us that our client’s needs are met first and that you feel comfortable with our entire staff including students.

When a student has reached a certain level in her training, she is given the opportunity to take on clients of her own under our full supervision. Sometimes these clients are women who the student knows and has brought under our care through her own relationship with them. At other times, we occasionally offer a reduced fee to someone in financial need if they will accept coming under the care of a student. Either way, it is important to remember that the students are always under the full supervision of the midwives, and that the midwives are ultimately responsible for every aspect of your care.