BADT is Celebrating 2022 and Welcoming 2023
Wow, another year of BADT in the books! Pausing, breathing, and reflecting is a practice that we value as an organization, and it’s a practice that birth workers engage in regularly. Y’all know, we are not strangers to processing!
2022 brought new celebrations and new challenges. BADT is growing and shifting and changing, just as you are. It’s an honor to look back at the last several months and acknowledge the journey we’ve been on. We are excited to plant seeds for the new year, and we are so glad you are here!
2022 At a Glance
New programming: BADT created and released two new four-module continuing education programs this year: Fertility and Conception and a Canadian version of the Abortion Doula CE Course. Additionally, we offered a workshop for birth workers about Domestic Violence and Intimate Partner Violence for the first time. And we released our first ever curriculum (read more below!). We are excited that so many folks showed up for these new, important offerings!
12- week Full-Spectrum Doula Training: 557 participants across 2 cohorts (fall and spring). This is our cornerstone course, and we are committed to offering this twice annually. We want to see a full-spectrum doula on every block! (This phrase is inspired by Raven, one of our Abortion Doula teachers, and JB, our Program Director and Lead Teacher.)
12- week Childbirth Educator Training: 190 participants in our spring cohort.
12-week Postpartum Doula Training: 64 participants in our summer cohort
4-week Continuing Education (CE) Courses: 74 participants in Birth and Disability; 20 participants in Queer and Trans Reproductive Support; 117 participants in Fertility and Conception, 395 participants in Abortion Doula. These courses offer deep dives into specific topics that fall under the Reproductive Justice umbrella. BADT is proud to take our work well beyond what you will find in a typical doula training organization.
Workshops: 180 participants in Crisis Response for Birthworkers; 91 participants in Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence Preparedness.
Complete Curriculum for Childbirth Educators: This year we launched our first educational product. BADT's team of industry experts and experienced educators developed a comprehensive and flexible curriculum that includes slide decks, teaching guides, handouts, and marketing templates.
Reclaiming our Bodies Retreat in January 2022: 375 attendees. It was such a blast to host our second virtual retreat, and it was an honor to have Ericka Hart as our keynote speaker.
BADT Forms: We released our Advocacy in the Birth Space forms this year, which support birth workers in acquiring advocacy skills. These forms also help prepare clients and their chosen support people to advocate in the birth space.
BADT Merch: We like to keep the merch fresh so that doulas and birth workers everywhere can wear their values on their sleeve. Check out our latest shirts and more here!
Scholarships: We offered nearly 500 scholarships across all courses and workshops. We have sustained a rate of 30% of Full Spectrum Doula Trainees participating on scholarship.
In addition to all of this data, we had hundreds of participants join our community through our prerecorded courses and one-off events, like our conversation with Britta Bushnell. Furthermore, we offered several private trainings on a variety of Reproductive Justice-focused topics for organizations that align with our values. We are proud of these partnerships, as we care deeply about working together to move the Reproductive Justice vision forward.
2022 BADT Team Celebrations
BADT hit the ground running in 2019, and this year, we got to dig in deep with our values. We are a small team with big visions, strong commitments to anti-oppressive work, and lots of exciting ideas. Our weekly check-ins, monthly team hangouts, and monthly marketing meetings have offered new structures that allow us to collaborate and co-create.
In 2022, we practiced collaborative decision-making to implement changes in our prices and scholarship process to support financial sustainability over time. We practiced transparency in communicating these shifts with our community, and it’s powerful to see the thoughtful ways folks responded to these shifts. Thank you for being here!
Our marketing strategy has been another focus in this past year, as we care deeply about making sales in ways that align with our values. We’ve been enjoying consulting with Jeffrey of Unconventional Agency, as we integrate new learning and strategy that allows us to highlight work we are proud of in grounded and ethical ways. Check out our IG to see the ways we are showing up!
Looking Forward to 2023
Moving into the new year, there is a lot to be excited about! We are slated to run our Full-Spectrum Doula Training live in the spring and fall, as well as Childbirth Educator Training in the summer.
We are particularly excited to highlight our brand new prerecorded CE course on providing reproductive support for folks who use drugs and those in recovery. This will be released in January 2023!
Several other CE courses, which are self-paced and available to you for one-year after purchase, will also be available in 2023. This includes Birth and Disability, Fertility and Conception, Queer and Trans Birth, Abortion Doula (US Context), Abotion Doula (Canadian Context–NEW). Our 12-week Postpartum Doula Training will also be available in this user-friendly prerecorded format.
Continuing to offer live learning spaces is important to us. We will offer Live Q&A Sessions with CE course instructors, as well as live panel discussions and workshops on CE course topics with experts in the field. Folks who are enrolled in prerecorded courses will have the opportunity to enroll in these live offerings.
BADT will continue to release new forms packages for birth workers, and our Complete Curriculum for Childbirth Educators will also be available on an ongoing basis. We are excited about the ways these tools offer birth workers a strong foundation from which to build their practices, and the community feedback has inspired us to keep creating!
Join Us
Thank you for joining us in reflecting on this past year! We are deeply grateful for the community that we are creating together– teachers, students, collaborators, and community partners.
Sign up for our newsletter here to stay in touch and join our offerings in 2023 and beyond! Here’s to a revolutionary 2023!