Mamatoto Village is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit organization, devoted to training the next generation of Perinatal Community Health Worker, and empowering women with the necessary tools to make informed decisions in their maternity care, parenting, and lives.
Our mission is two fold: to provide complimentary and low-cost maternity support services to women and their families during pregnancy through the first year of the child's life, and to facilitate the increase of qualified women of color serving in the Maternal Health profession. By promoting health equity, which will aid in the reduction of barriers and inequality in maternal and child health for women of color in the D.C. Metro Area, we aim to foster healthy individuals, healthy families and healthy communities.
Mamatoto Village (MV) began in 2008 as a vision written for a graduate school paper, by Aza Nedhari. In 2012, after having worked in a for profit capacity as Doulas, and feeling as if their own training had been inadequate, Aza Nedhari and Cassietta Pringle, decided to form a collaborative partnership and bring Mamatoto Village to life. Witnessing the disparities and lack of cultural empathy in Maternal Health professions, MV founders saw a critical need for the creation of a career-training program for birth workers of color and for direct maternity support services to medically underserved populations.