Virginia Union College To Launch Doula Certification Program

Virginia Union College is making historical past with the launch of its Doula Certification Program—the primary of its type at a Traditionally Black Faculty or College (HBCU). This pioneering initiative is designed to assist shut the hole in racial disparities surrounding maternal and toddler well being. In collaboration with Delivery In Colour and the Virginia Division of Well being (VDH), the six-month program equips college students with the abilities and coaching wanted to turn out to be licensed doulas, offering unbiased, culturally competent care to expectant households all through the Commonwealth, in line with a press launch.

Now in its second cohort since Fall 2025, this system is a key a part of Virginia Union College’s broader Well being Fairness Initiatives. By combining well being fairness with workforce growth, Virginia Union is deepening its impression in public well being and healthcare schooling, driving significant change within the lives of Black households and communities. Additional updates on this system’s development and future route are anticipated quickly.

Why do doulas matter?

A doula is a educated skilled who supplies not solely help throughout beginning, however emotional, bodily, and informational help to people earlier than, throughout, and after childbirth. Not like medical doctors or midwives, doulas don’t provide medical care or ship infants; as an alternative, they concentrate on holistic help tailor-made to the birthing particular person’s wants. In accordance with Deliberate Parenthood, there are a number of kinds of doulas, together with beginning doulas, who help people throughout labor supply and after childbirth. 

They supply consolation measures resembling therapeutic massage, respiration methods, and place modifications, whereas additionally providing instructional help, serving to with communication within the hospital setting, and providing steering. Postpartum doulas help households within the early days after beginning whereas antepartum doulas help moms throughout high-risk pregnancies. Total, these essential medical professionals function a relaxed, educated presence throughout what will be one of the intense and transformative instances in an individual’s life.

Black girls in Virginia are in determined want of high quality maternal care.

In Virginia, the necessity for doulas has turn out to be more and more pressing because the maternal mortality disaster continues to disproportionately have an effect on Black girls, who’re greater than twice as prone to die from pregnancy-related causes in comparison with their white counterparts. In accordance with the Nationwide Black Ladies’s Reproductive Agenda, Virginia ranked twelfth within the nation for maternal mortality in 2024. Between 2018 and 2021, the state recorded 65 pregnancy-related deaths, with a maternal mortality price of twenty-two.3 deaths per 100,000 stay births, larger than the nationwide common of 20.4 per 100,000.

Racial bias in healthcare, restricted entry to high quality prenatal care and better charges of persistent underlying well being circumstances contribute to the rising disparity, however all of those elements are preventable. Felicia D. Cosby, Dean of Virginia Union Technical Faculty, believes that the HBCU’s groundbreaking program is an important first step towards making certain Black girls obtain the holistic, culturally competent care they deserve.

“As we launch this pioneering Doula Certification Program, we’re taking a daring step towards reworking Black maternal and toddler healthcare in Virginia,” Cosby stated in an announcement. “This program is greater than coaching—it’s about saving lives, lowering disparities, and empowering communities.”