Kate Woods
Founder, Doula Educator, Board Member
Kate has been working as an accredited Doula, Mentor and Educator for over 24 years.
Kate is an advocate for dignified birth and a passionate activist for informed choice in birth, working also as an RCM accredited trauma-informed educator and a mental health first-aider. Kate's passion for protecting human rights in birth led her found the voluntary Doula organisation, Doulas Without Borders, from where this project was launched.
Grace Collins
Educator, Translator, Board member
Grace is a Lebanese Canadian Doula, hypnobirthing tutor and maternity support worker who has lived in the UK for over 22 years. She started her doula journey 10 years ago after the birth of her second child.
Grace has a special interest in maternal and new-born health particularly pertaining to migrant families. She also has extensive experience teaching antenatal preparation courses and interpreting for Arabic speaking resettled families. Her interpretation support is undertaken in a voluntary capacity and she has volunteered for several non- governmental organisations that offer such services since the 1990s. Most recently Grace has acted as an interpreter a community resettlement scheme in her hometown of Reading and for Doulas without Borders.
Professor Şebnem Susam-Sareva
Translation Educator, Doula, Board member
Şebnem Susam-Saraeva is a Senior Lecturer in Translation Studies at the University of Edinburgh, and an experienced birth and postnatal doula. She worked as a translator and interpreter for many years before going into academia. Her research interests have included gender and translation, and translation and maternal & neonatal health. She is the co-editor of the Routledge Handbook of Translation and Health (2021).
Amina Hatia
Educator & Board member
Amina is a midwife working currently in both the NHS and charity sector, having been involved in midwifery care since 2005.
Amina is a passionate advocate for women and families achieving the best birth experience for them, using knowledge and empowerment gained from women-centred education, support and care, believing that the core of midwifery is embedded in kindness and support.
Hazel Williams
Head of Funding
Hazel has been working and volunteering with refugees and people seeking asylum for the past 20 years, in various charities in the UK, Europe and Africa, to ensure their rights and dignity are protected.
She is currently the Director of a national network of organisations seeking to end destitution amongst migrants, and prior to this was the Director of a national legal charity protecting the legal rights to food and shelter for people seeking asylum.
Fatima Saafa
Community Translator, Board member & Mother Tongue Doula
Fatima is passionate about being both an advocate for people in the childbearing year and a birth-related translator. Fatima is from Syria and has been in the UK for 5 years, having arrived as a refugee with her 5 children.
Having completed the pilot Mother Tongue Doula training, Fatima is excited to support women and birthing people to understand the healthcare system in the UK, to make informed choices and to be understood in their own language by healthcare professionals.