Become a Successful Doula
Become the Doula Families Can’t Help but Recommend.
10 Years of 100% Maternal Survival. One Proven Pathway to Success.
Sweet Bee Academy offers the only clinical foundation blended with a high-touch business launchpad proven to save lives while you make money. Whether you are starting from scratch or integrating your current professional expertise, we provide the blueprint for excellence and the systems for success.
Your Pathway to A Thriving Doula Career
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Step 1: The Foundation
Build an unshakeable foundation of confidence and competence. Lose the overwhelm of being in a clinical setting, and learn everything you need to handle even the most unexpected complexities. You start the program a beginner. You finish it a highly skilled doula.
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Step 2: The Bridge
The Bridge™ is the second tier of the Academy. You’ll go from trained to the doula people can’t wait to hire. We show you how to build the administrative systems, niche, and partnerships that establish the business side of your practice without burning out. You leave certified, and able to own a thriving birth business on your own terms.
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Step 3: The Colony
Once you certify, you join The Colony, your professional home. Biweekly coaching, a community of working doulas, and a listing in the Sweet Bee Doula Network, so families can find you and reach out directly.
Sweet Bee Academy Reviews
Meet Your Instructor
Leah Hairston, MSSW, CD, CLC, CBE
Perinatal Social Worker
Full-Spectrum Doula
Childbirth Educator
Certified Lactation Counselor
Leah Hairston is a seasoned birth professional on a mission to revolutionize maternal care through education, empowerment, and advocacy. With over 10 years of hands-on experience and 200+ families served, Leah leads with both professional insight and compassionate leadership. She became a 6-figure doula and now shows others the clear pathway to a successful, burnout-free doula career.
FAQs
Format & Support
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No. Sweet Bee Academy trains doulas virtually. Coursework for The Foundation & The Bridge are self-paced, giving you the flexibility to move at your own speed. Our live coaching calls runs weekly, biweekly, or monthly depending on where you are in The Academy™. Realtime coaching, on a consistent schedule, the whole way through.
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Sweet Bee Academy runs rolling open admission. No cohorts and no waiting for a start date. When you enroll, you begin with our Before You Begin course to set the stage, and prepare you for the process. After that, you move through The Foundation and The Bridge.
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Each of our Foundation students receives live coaching and direct teaching from Doula Leah, based off of 10 years of experience and a private supportive community. When you’re ready, The Bridge™ adds real accountability so you build your doula practice with tangible support.
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Yes. At each stage, we have private WhatsApp groups with Doula Leah and the Education team. Birth work isn't meant to be done alone, and neither is training for it. Additionally, after The Bridge™ our students move into The Colony™.
Certification & Credentialing
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The Foundation forms you in the full scope of doula practice. The Bridge earns you your Sweet Bee certification, proof you built and launched a real practice, not just sat through a course.
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Sweet Bee is Maryland Medicaid credentialed across all nine MCOs. If a specific hospital, agency, or payer matters to your plans, ask us.
Investment & Payment
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Tuition is $3,000. A $1,000 deposit reserves your seat, and payment plans are available. That covers The Foundation™. The Bridge™ is $197/month and can be completed as quickly as you like.
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Yes. Interest-free plans are available after the deposit. Klarna, Affirm, and Afterpay too, so the career change you're called to is actually within reach.
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No, we do not offer refunds. The Academy™ builds in flexibility instead: programs that fit your time and your life as you build your career.
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Limited aid is available for students serving Medicaid-eligible families, first-generation doulas, and students committed to equity-centered maternal health. Right now, that aid comes through our institutional partners only.
Curriculum
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The Foundation is six modules: who you are and the history you're stepping into, the body and physiological birth, high-risk variations and trauma-informed care, person-centered care for every kind of family, the fourth trimester, and the business of being a doula. Ten years in, over two hundred high-risk families, one hundred percent survival. The Foundation is built from that record.
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The Bridge turns formation into practice. Financial systems, time management, and self-care. Peer networks and mentorship. Marketing, client communication, and legal protection. A guided path to your first client. It ends with your Sweet Bee certification.
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Yes. You'll learn labor physiology and comfort measures, and you'll learn high-risk pregnancy, warning signs like preeclampsia, and obstetric emergencies. A doula who only knows one side of birth isn't ready for the room.
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Yes, for every student, not as an add-on. Trauma-informed presence, cultural humility, and affirming care for LGBTQIA+ families are core to The Foundation.
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Doula Leah teaches the full training, with guest lectures from pelvic floor therapists, lactation experts, registered dietitians, and other practitioners in the Sweet Bee network.
Knowing SBA is for You
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No. Sweet Bee Academy is built for beginners who feel called to birthwork. We teach you everything you need to start your career with confidence, from the first module to your first client.
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Our standard: 10 years, over 200 high-risk families, 100% maternal survival. That record is why The Foundation and The Bridge are built the way they are: formation rather than just information, real coaching at every stage, and a certification that means you actually built a practice. We ask you to bring the same standard we hold ourselves to.
