Hi, lovely midwives. If you could spare some time to help a newbie, I'd be forever grateful. I'm a 26yo CC graduate and doula choosing 2-year Traditional BSN programs now (and have to decide by May 1st). My plan is to follow graduation with a residency, 1-2 years of floor or community work, and then the MSN in Midwifery. What do I need to know, or what do you wish you had known, when you were choosing your undergrad? How much does it matter who my instructor is for Nursing of Women & Children/Maternal-Infant Nursing/Women's Health, and do different schools teach this course very differently? Should I make sure a midwife is likely to be my teacher, and try to figure out how much the school-determined content supports physiologic birth rather than the medical model? Or do all schools pretty much teach a medical approach? If a school's WH course is fewer credits than other specialized courses (Med-Surg, Gerontology, etc.), does that really mean WH is a smaller part of the curriculum? What should I look for in the university hospital and other affiliated clinical sites - Baby-Friendly, midwives on the floor, has/doesn't have a well-baby nursery, etc? If I choose a school whose placement office handles clinicals, will I be able to ask for placement at a site that really promotes evidence-based birth, or is it luck of the draw? WH service learning trips - how respectful are these partnerships likely to be of local people and customs? Who is a 10-day program really helping, the women or the students? I have a choice between a school offering a 10-day trip to an international maternal health intervention & research site in a developing country with dire statistics, and one offering a 10-week trip that is basically study abroad with clinicals in a newly developed country where I speak the language, with the option to lengthen to a 6-month paid internship. Then there's the school where I would basically figure it out myself, but has a rural health project on smoking cessation during pregnancy. Will I have any opportunity to work as an undergrad research assistant, or does this vary by school? How much should I weigh faculty research interests in my decision? Or whether the school has a midwifery grad program? Did your BSN program's name recognition affect your MSN applications or your job prospects? (Especially if you relocated, did anybody care if you went to a super fancy school?) Should I just pick the cheapest one?? Should I just pick the one closest to my grandparents, or my parents?? Should I just pick the one where I don't have to move states?? Or the warmest one?? Or the city with the lowest rent?? Should I just scrap it all and hitchhike across the country?? For reference - I'm choosing between Emory in Atlanta, Drexel in Philadelphia (where I live now), and Binghamton in New York State, and waiting to hear from VCU in Richmond, VA. Only Emory has a midwifery MSN, but I don't think my partner would want to stay in Atlanta for that long. THANK YOU!!!