“Continuing my internship with the New Orleans Maternal and Child Health Coalition”
by Emma Allen
This semester, I had the pleasure of continuing my Reproductive Rights and Reproductive Health Internship with the New Orleans Maternal and Child Health Coalition. I serve as a Research Assistant on their project examining the efficacy of the coalition, its past performance, and how to improve the coalition in the future.
During the summer, when the project was just getting off the ground, my job was to prepare and organize all the documents, presentations, agendas, and to help make sure all the groundwork was laid before interviews could start. The interviews took place all semester, and my primary job was transcribing them. Through my internship, and more specifically transcribing all the interviews, I had the opportunity to learn about the breadth of organizations in New Orleans doing the work on the ground to improve maternal and child health, including birth outcomes. The New Orleans Maternal and Child Health consists of individuals from community organizations, such as the Birthmark Doula Collective, statewide organizations such as the Louisiana Department of Public Health, individual entrepreneurs, and midwives.
As a Political Economy & English major, the education I have gained from learning about the various maternal and child health organizations in New Orleans has added to my classwork and provided new, interdisciplinary layers to my feminist education.
The Reproductive Rights and Reproductive Health Internship Program has allowed me to participate in a field, reproductive justice, that would not usually be available to a liberal arts major. I have gained experience in research and have the privilege of being involved with the research project since the beginning stages. It has shown me how much value is in smaller tasks, such as making document inventories and transcribing interviews, as well as how much goes into getting a project off the ground. It has made me more knowledgeable about the city I go to school in and the problems that affect reproductive justice.
I am so thankful for my experience this semester as a research assistant and so excited to continue my position virtually next semester. I cannot wait to see the next stage of this project and continue learning about the maternal and child health scene in New Orleans.