Milwaukee Center for Independence

Description

SmartBaby offers prenatal care coordination services to girls and women that need extra support, services and guidance during their pregnancy to better prepare for the arrival of their newborn. We promote safe sleep, breastfeeding, proper nutrition for mother and baby, and positive parenting styles. Our SmartBaby program has a couple additional unique components. Each expectant mother is paired up with a Mommy Mentor, a mom that is a positive role model who volunteers to talk to her about various issues and spend quality time together throughout her pregnancy and thereafter. We also have an incentive piece, Stork’s Nest, where the expectant mother can earn points to "buy" baby items that we have in the Nest such as diapers, wipes, clothing, educational materials and many other supplies through program participation. In addition, we hold monthly educational groups (Thursday evenings) at our SmartBaby University that touches on a number of parenting topics such as child nutrition for brain development, social emotional development of your child, reading to your child and developing her vocabulary, discipline, stress, etc. In addition, we collaborate with the African American Breastfeeding Network monthly at Breastfeeding Gatherings to encourage breastfeeding. SmartBaby offers Wellness and Nutrition counseling and a Certified Lactation Specialist’s support and guidance with breastfeeding. The goal of SmartBaby is to offer expectant mothers supportive services and education to enrich their lives and better prepare them for healthy birth outcomes and positive parenting practices.