Body Sovereignty: Reclaiming Birth, Reclaiming Power
March 3rd, 2026: 9:00 – 12:30 PST | 12:00 – 15:30 EST
March 4th, 2026: 9:00 – 12:30 PST | 12:00 – 15:30 EST
online event
*Simultaneous translation to Inuktitut
The National Council of Indigenous Midwives invites you join our 2026 National Virtual Forum — Body Sovereignty: Reclaiming Birth, Reclaiming Power, convening Indigenous midwives, students, Elders, youth, survivors, advocates, and allies.
The forum examines systems that regulate and harm Indigenous bodies, including coerced and forced sterilization, birth evacuation policies, colonial regulation of care, pretendianism, and workforce shortages rooted in structural racism. This is a strategic, action-oriented gathering to name harm, amplify survivor voices, share tools, and strengthen pathways toward Indigenous-led, community-based care.
DAY 1 – MARCH 3rd
9:00 – 9:45 PST | 12:00 – 12:45 EST
Pauline Waterfall is a Heiltsuk educator and leader from Bella Bella, BC, whose life reflects the ongoing exercise of Indigenous sovereignty. A residential school survivor, she returned home to reclaim her identity and helped renew the potlatch after its 66-year ban. In response to a 98% high school drop-out rate, she co-founded the Bella Bella School Board in 1976 and established Heiltsuk College, enabling generations of students to complete high school at home.
A graduate of UBC’s Indigenous Teacher Education Program, Pauline also advanced Heiltsuk language revitalization while reclaiming her own fluency. She carries forward the legacy of her grandmother Hilistis, a respected scholar and mentor, as a knowledge keeper and champion of her Nation’s cultural renewal.
9:45 – 10:15 PST | 12:45 – 13:15 EST
Alyssa Gagnon explores hide tanning as a land-based, intergenerational practice where infants and caregivers learn regulation, safety, and embodied knowledge through witnessing and participation. Grounded in Indigenous midwifery practice, it centers land-based work as essential to postpartum care, healing, and Indigenous body sovereignty.
Alyssa Gagnon is an Indigenous midwife registered with Taykwa Tagamou Nation, as well as a parent, artist, hide tanner, and cultural competency provider. Rooted in the lands of her ancestors along James Bay, she is deeply committed to bringing birth back to her community.
Inspired by her grandfather’s experience as a residential school survivor, Alyssa became a midwife to support healing and reclaim traditional birth practices. She is a founding member of the Nîhtahwikiwin (Growth) project, which works with Mushkegowuk Elders to revitalize birth knowledge and establish an Indigenous Midwifery Program in Taykwa Tagamou.
10:15 – 10:45 PST | 13:15 – 13:45 EST
This presentation examines the costs and impacts of birth evacuation in Indigenous communities, using policy analysis and national travel data to show how displacement from community affects families, midwives, and care systems. It invites a reimagining of investment in Indigenous-led midwifery and local birth services as a pathway to wellbeing, continuity, and self-determination.
Dr. Jennifer Leason is an off-reserve member of Minegoziibe Anishinabe Pine Creek Indian Band, Manitoba and the proud mother of Lucas and Lucy. Dr. Leason is a Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR), Canada Research Chair, Tier II, Indigenous Maternal Child Wellness and an Associate Professor at the University of Calgary. Her research aims to address perinatal and maternal-child health disparities and inequities by examining maternity experiences, healthcare utilization, and social-cultural contexts of Indigenous maternal child wellness.
10:45 – 11:00 PST | 14:45 – 14:00 EST
BREAK
11:00 – 11:15 PST | 14:00 – 14:15 EST
Dr. Lisa Boivin is an artist and bioethicist. A member of the Deninu K’ue First Nation in the Northwest Territories, she brings together bioethics and the land-based practices of Dene medicine through her paintings and writing. Dr. Boivin is a bioethics specialist in the Faculty of Arts & Science at the University of Toronto.
11:15 – 12:15 PST | 14:15– 15:15 EST
This presentation examines the harms of Indigenous identity fraud within Indigenous midwifery in Ontario and shares how the Association of Ontario Midwives is working to address and prevent it. It invites collective dialogue on accountability, safety, and Indigenous-led approaches to protecting resources, relationships, and the integrity of Indigenous midwifery practice.
Miranda Kelly (Tilyen) is of Stó:lō and mixed settler ancestry and lives in her home community of Soowahlie First Nation near Chilliwack, BC, with her husband and two children. She carries the ancestral name Tilyen and works to honour her ancestors by advancing the well-being of Indigenous peoples across these lands.
With seventeen years of experience in Indigenous health, Miranda has held roles in leadership, planning, policy, evaluation, education, and research. She holds a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Public Health and grounds her work in lived experience and community teachings. Following the loss of her oldest sister in 2022, she transitioned to full-time consulting, partnering with organizations committed to dismantling anti-Indigenous racism in health care and strengthening Indigenous-led approaches to health and healing.
12:15 – 12:30 PST | 15:15– 15:30 EST
Day 1 Wrap Up
DAY 2 – MARCH 4th
9:00 – 9:15 PST | 12:00 – 12:5 EST
Opening Remarks
9:15 – 9:45 PST | 12:15 – 12:45 EST
The Survivors Circle for Reproductive Justice shares an overview of their work and advocacy in response to forced and coerced sterilization, centering survivor leadership and collective resistance. The session situates Bill S-228 within broader struggles for reproductive justice, accountability, and Indigenous bodily sovereignty. This is also a placeholder, please feel free to replace it in whatever way best reflects your collective voice.
9:45 – 10:15 PST | 12:45 – 13:15 EST
You are invited to make yourself the priority. In this 30-minute session, Jace Poirier Lacerte offers permission to create safety within your own body. Drawing on lived experience of chronic stress and illness, Jace shares practices that supported her journey from illness toward wellness. In this space, pain is gently transmuted into purpose. Participants are offered simple, accessible ways to reconnect with themselves: practices that promote safety, reduce the accumulation of trauma, and support the release of stress held in the body.
Jace Poirier Lacerte (she/her) is a mixed-heritage Métis educator, social impact strategist, entrepreneur, and mother who lives on the territory of the Lekwungen-speaking peoples. A BC-trained teacher, she has developed nationally recognized STEM curricula and shaped education outreach across Canada, grounded in culturally relevant, trauma-informed, and place-based approaches.
Formerly Shopify’s Global Lead for Indigenous Entrepreneurs, Jace has coached hundreds of Indigenous businesses in support of economic sovereignty. She is the founder of COYA Productions and creator of Rooted Action Analysis™, an Indigenous evaluation methodology aligning impact with values and community wellbeing. In 2025, she launched Family Stewards and is helping lead the vision for the Southern Vancouver Island Birth Centre.
10:15 – 10:30 PST | 13:15 – 13:30 EST
In this session, NYSHN shares You Are Made of Medicine, a peer-led mental health and wellness manual grounded in Indigenous knowledge, reproductive justice, and youth lived experience. Drawing on community advocacy and decades of work addressing geographic racism and access disparities, this presentation highlights culturally rooted, youth-centred approaches to mental health, care, and healing for Indigiqueer, Two-Spirit, LGBTQ+, and gender-diverse Indigenous youth.
Emma Antoine-Allan is an Anishinaabe youth from Sharbot Lake, Ontario, who grew up in Tkaronto surrounded by their moms, sister, and a strong network of urban Indigenous aunties and cousins. Guided by the teachings of their grandmothers and relatives—including Sue Jackson, Fay Hollywood, and Donna Ladouceur—Emma strives to walk gently with the gifts they have been given.
They have organized with the Native Youth Sexual Health Network since childhood and now work with its core team to advance reproductive justice for Indigenous communities. Currently living in lək̓ʷəŋən territory, Emma studies at the University of Victoria and is committed to being a good relative to the lands, waters, skies, and Nations who care for them.
10:30 – 10:45 PST | 13:30 – 13:45 EST
BREAK
10:45 – 12:00 PST | 13:45– 15:00 EST
Join Indigenous midwifery students from community-based programs from coast to coast to coast as they share how midwives are being trained within their own Nations and territories. From Inuit and Innu midwifery education to Indigenous Midwifery Education (IME) programs, this session highlights the power of land-based learning, language, culture, and community leadership in shaping the next generation of Indigenous midwives.
The session will conclude with a Q&A featuring Indigenous midwifery students, offering space for dialogue, reflection, and connection.
Nilak Ironhawk-Tommy is a licensed practical nurse with nearly two decades of service with Cowichan Tribes and Island Health, integrating Indigenous and Western approaches to community care. Since 2019, she has supported maternal, child, youth, and family wellness through culturally grounded programs with Hwialusmutul’s Community Health Team.
Now studying Indigenous midwifery with the National Council of Indigenous Midwives’ Indigenous Midwifery Education Program, she is committed to reclaiming and revitalizing ancestral birth practices. Rooted in her Cowichan worldview and guided by generations of birth workers in her family, her work centres Indigenous self-determination and the health of her community.
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An Inuk student will speak form the Inuulitsivik Midwifery Education Program.
Based in Nunavik, the Inuulitsivik Midwifery Education Program is a community-rooted, clinically based training model that integrates Inuit traditional knowledge with modern medicine. Since the opening of the Puvirnituq maternity ward in 1986—and later in Salluit and Inukjuak—Inuit midwives have helped bring birth back to the North, with over 90% of Hudson Coast births now taking place in Nunavik.
Recognized by Québec’s Ministry of Health since 2008, the program prepares student midwives through hands-on clinical practice under senior midwife supervision. Graduates are recognized by the Ordre des sages-femmes du Québec, strengthening Inuit-led maternity care grounded in language, culture, and community.
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Emma White and Kim Bridle are Innu student midwives with the Innu Round Table Secretariat’s Innu Midwifery Education Program. Emma is a member of Mushuau Innu First Nation, and Kim is a member of Sheshatshiu Innu First Nation and lives in Happy Valley–Goose Bay.
Both are committed to strengthening culturally safe, community-based birth care for Innu families. Inspired by personal experiences, ancestral teachings, and the desire to keep families together during pregnancy and birth, they are training to provide informed choice, continuity of care, and meaningful, culturally grounded birth experiences in their communities.
12:00 – 12:30 PST | 15:00 – 15:30 EST
Event Closing with Heiltsuk Elder Pauline Waterfall