Illinois Birth Justice State Strategic Plan Summit

You’ve held the date, and now it’s time to confirm you’re coming!

Please complete your registration here to join us September 25th in Chicago where we’ll gather to “Connect, Learn, Organize, and Ignite” toward sustainable birth justice and reproductive justice care workforces in Illinois.

As part of an 18-month state strategic planning project, Black Midwifery Collective and Health and Medicine Policy Research Group are convening community-based birth and reproductive health justice workforces and stakeholders to create a shared vision and joint action plan for improving perinatal health outcomes and birth justice in Illinois.

September 25 & 26, 2025

8:30am - 5:30pm

Shine Bright Community Center

8560 S. Cottage Grove Ave. Chicago, IL 60619

Sept. 25 (Day 1): Open to the public and stakeholders

We will present results from multiple, recent Illinois community-based birth workforce surveys and landscape analysis. You will have a chance to join breakout sessions that are focused on themes that emerged from workforce survey results. We will provide time and space for birth workers and stakeholders to discuss pressing workforce issues with people in their own profession and across disciplines.

Sept 26 (Day 2:) Invitation only for community-based workers

Day 2 is planned for a smaller group of people who provide community-based services to unjustly served communities using a birth justice approach. We will spend the day engaging in deep discussion and strategic planning around the needs, future direction and resource allocation for Illinois community-based birth justice workforces. If you are an invited birth justice worker, you will receive a separate email invitation for Day 2 with information on stipend and other logistics.

Stay tuned for speaker information and more details to come.

Hosts:

Black Midwifery Collective

Strategic Planning and Facilitation:

Anna Yankelev, Health and Medicine Policy Research

Glenance Green, Green Solutions Group/ Black Researcher's Collective

The event is sponsored by: Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Background:

Illinois has a robust community-based birth justice community that is working toward similar goals and has supportive elected officials that acknowledge community-based health care innovations can address perinatal health disparities and improve outcomes.

However, funding, agendas, strategic plans and programs are siloed. Currently, there is a need for a collectively articulated and agreed upon, statewide community-based perinatal strategic agenda with a focus on communities that are experiencing the highest rates of maternal mortality and morbidity.

This agenda must be defined by community-based professionals, organizations and community members who choose, depend on and provide community-based services.

The IL Birthing Justice State Strategic Plan

The Black Midwifery Collective is leading the formation of a statewide birth justice collaborative in drafting a strategic system-level plan for Illinois’ community-based birth justice perinatal service providers and stakeholders. The strategic plan will act as a foundation for a community-based shared vision and joint action-plan to advance perinatal health and birth justice and reproductive justice in Illinois.

This project centers people who provide community-based clinical or support services for birth and reproductive care in disproportionately affected communities and have expertise in one or more of the following sectors: abortion/reproductive health services, birth center services, community health workers, doula care, home birth services, home visiting, lactation support, medicaid services, mental health services, midwifery care, migrant health, and support of people who use substances.

The outcome of this project will be:

a) A comprehensive strategic plan outlining strategic priorities for the community-based perinatal health providers for reduction of disproportionally high BIPOC maternal and infant mortality.

b) A cohesive, organized network of community-based perinatal health providers to move strategic priorities forward in a unified manner.

There are a variety of perinatal health-related strategic plans being developed currently in Illinois. HOWEVER, THIS IS THE ONLY STRATEGIC PLAN BEING DEVELOPED BY AND FOR COMMUNITY-BASED WORKFORCES WHO PRACTICE BIRTH JUSTICE AND REPRODUCTIVE JUSTICE.

Host or Publisher Black Midwifery Collective