Our Team

Midwifery Education Board and Staff

Curriculum Advisory Board

Dr. Aviva Romm is a Yale-trained physician specializing in integrative medicine for women and children, a midwife, an herbalist, an award-winning author, and the creator/owner of WomanWise, on-line courses dedicated to vitality and optimal health for women and children. She is a mother, a teacher and speaker, an artist, and a woman who lives from the heart. She has spent nearly 30 years as a health care practitioner and advocate for women and children.

Deborah Flowers  has been a practicing midwife on The Farm since 1986 and teaches Neonatal Resuscitation and other classes for The Farm midwifery Center. Deborah worked with Plenty International, in Sololá Guatemala, in 1978 to 1980 and then again in 2000 serving as the director of a midwifery and childbirth education program, conducting trainings for 12 Mayan women from 10 different villages in southern Belize. The program has conducted two additional trainings and Deborah has returned to do follow-up visits and continuing education classes with the trainees. Deborah also worked as an RN at Williamson Medical Center in Franklin, TN in the well-baby nursery and NICU for 10 years.

Elizabeth Davis is a renowned expert on women’s issues, and has been a midwife, women’s health care specialist, educator and consultant for over 30 years. She is internationally active in promoting motherbaby-centered birth and is widely sought after for her expertise in midwifery education and organizational development. She served as a representative to the Midwives Alliance of North America for five years and as President of the Midwifery Education Accreditation Council for the United States. She holds a degree in Holistic Maternity Care from Antioch University, and is certified by the North American Registry of Midwives.

Jacky Bloemraad-de Boer was born in South Africa and has lived and worked in Amsterdam for the last 22 years. She is a mother and has a practice in Amsterdam as a doula, acupuncturist, nutritionist and reflexologist specializing in midwifery. She lectures acupuncturists in Acupuncture for Pregnancy and Childbirth. For four months of the year she lives and work in South Africa where she trains doulas for the Medi-Clinic, works as a midwife and gives Complementary Health in Midwifery and Childbirth workshops to midwives and doulas.  She has published a book on pregnancy and childbirth called, A-Z for a Healthy Pregnancy and Natural Childbirth.

Jan Tritten is the founder and editor-in-chief of Midwifery Today magazine and a midwife who was in active practice from 1977–1989. She became a midwife in 1977 after the powerful homebirth of one of her daughters. Her mission is to make loving midwifery care the norm for birthing women and their babies throughout the world. Meet Jan at Midwifery Today conferences around the world!

Kassia Binkowski is a maternal and child health professional with experience across Latin America and Africa. While pursuing her Masters of Public Health, Kassia focused on early life development and specifically the developmental origins of disease. Her expertise in this arena only provides additional motivation to safeguard the first 33 months of development, including a safe pregnancy and delivery, so that children can reach their full developmental potential. To that end, Kassia has contributed to the programming, communications, and fundraising efforts of maternal and child health programs around the world. Most recently, Kassia founded The Righters (www.the-righters.com) as an online forum for the voices of workers from the front lines of social movements.

Mary (“Mamie”) Guidera graduated from Villanova University with a BSN and returned for an MSN in Administration. She later returned to graduate school at the Frontier School of Nursing and Midwifery in Hyden Kentucky, the oldest Midwifery School in the country, for a post masters certification in Midwifery. She is in clinical practice, is an advanced senior lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, and is a member of the Professional Liability Section of the American College of Nurse Midwives.

Robbie Davis-Floyd, PhD, Senior Research Fellow, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Texas Austin, and Fellow of the Society for Applied Anthropology, is a medical anthropologist specializing in the anthropology of reproduction. Robbie lectures at childbirth, midwifery and obstetrical conferences around the world. Robbie has written over 80 articles and the book Birth as an American Rite of Passage (2004). Her research on global trends and transformations in childbirth, obstetrics and midwifery is ongoing.

Vicki Penwell is a Certified Professional Midwife, Licensed Midwife (New Mexico) and health educator. Vicki and her husband, Scott, founded the ministry that became Mercy In Action in the Philippines over 30 years ago. Their hard work and successful model has led Vicki to be invited to speak at universities and conferences around the world including the International Confederation of Midwives Congress in Vienna, Austria. She is featured in the book edited by Robbie Davis Floyd entitled “Birth Models That Work“. Vicki’s first Masters degree is in Midwifery and her second is in InterCultural Studies. She is currently living and practicing clinical midwifery among the poor in the Philippines, and is working on her PhD in International Maternal/Child Health.

StaffMidwifery Education Board and Staff

Sarah Kraft, President/CEO, has 14-years of combined experience in leadership-training, public relations and business development with a focus on women’s empowerment and maternal health. Though Sarah did not go on to earn her certification as a midwife, she studied and apprenticed with Midwives for 2+ years in Boulder, Colorado and Portland, Maine. Sarah’s struggle to find a viable pathway to midwifery is what inspired her to co-found Midwife International. Someday, Sarah hopes to be catching babies alongside Midwife International students. She has had both of her children at home with a Certified Professional Midwife. Midwifery education board and

Sierra Brashear, Communications Manager, holds an MA in Natural Resources and Environmental Security. Sierra has worked on outreach and development for organizations such as the University of Colorado Environmental Center, Global Greengrants Fund, the Restorative Leadership Institute and Un Mundo, among others. Through her unique experiences studying and working in Latin America, Africa, and home in Colorado, Sierra has developed a passion for working towards social and environmental justice through community engagement, leadership education and empowerment of women. Sierra also dances in a Boulder-based West African dance company called Logo Ligi.Midwifery Education Board and Staff

MacKenzie Ziegler, Associate Director of Admissions, holds a B.S. in Exercise Physiology, and a Masters in Business Administration. After completing her education she worked in healthcare as a Cardiac Rehabilitation therapist at a hospital in North Denver. She then transitioned into a career in higher education, where she spent eight years working professionally in admissions, business development and training as the Enrollment Training and Recruiting Manager for Apollo Group, Inc.  Most recently, Mackenzie was the Sales Director for It’s Just Lunch. MacKenzie is originally from Wisconsin, but has been in Colorado for about ten years. She has a 4-year-old daughter and baby on the way.

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Nondiscrimination Policy

Midwife International is committed to a policy of fair representation on the board of directors and will not discriminate on the basis of race, disability, sex, color, religion, sexual orientation, geography or age.  Directors shall be selected on the basis of representation from the nonprofit sector, the business community, and the community at large.