Apprentices

Greetings everybody!
We are sad to say that Emily Hannewald, who many of you met during January and February, has decided not to return to NY at this time. She is working on legislative efforts to improve access to midwifery care in California. She feels inspired to bring awareness to the public. In a recent email, Emily wrote: "I miss being part of the community with you for sure, but am also really enjoying what I am up to here. I am organizing an event/art show in my community to bring awareness to home birth and access to resources. I am very much inspired to finish up my CBE [Childbirth Education Certification] so that I can offer free classes to the community. Orange county is really in need of awareness and options."

We welcome Ellen Harris-Braun to our practice as our current intern. Ellen is a midwifery student, an experienced doula (certified by DONA), and a teacher of childbirth classes that focus on the normal birth process (certified by Lamaze). She has been attending births since 2002, teaching about pregnancy and childbirth since 2000, and parenting since 1998 (certified by Will, born in a hospital with an OB, and Jesse, born in 2001 at a freestanding birth center with midwives). Ellen has a BA in anthropology and psychology and has studied midwifery at the Farm and through Elizabeth Davis's Heart & Hands Midwifery Intensives. She serves as a member of the Commission for the Accreditation of Birth Centers (CABC), reviewing how well birth centers meet the standards of the American Association of Birth Centers. She also is involved with BirthNet in Albany and creates informational events about birth and midwifery in the Berkshires with her doula network, Berkshire-Columbia Doulas. In her "spare" time, she and her family are designing and building a strawbale house as part of the Quaker Intentional Village in East Chatham, New York.