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Judy Rogers

Claire Dion Fletcher

Assistant Professor
EducationRM, MA, BHSc, BS
OfficeDCC-672
Phone416-979-5000 ext 544781

Claire Dion Fletcher is an Indigenous (Lenape- Potawatomi) and mixed settler Registered Midwife practicing at Seventh Generation Midwives Toronto. Claire is committed to reproductive justice and Indigenous feminism and how these frameworks shape midwifery education and practice.

Claire has numerous roles in the midwifery community, she is currently co-chair of the National Aboriginal Council of Midwives (NACM) and sits on the Board of the Canadian Association of Midwives, she was previously co-chair of the Toronto Birth Centre Community Council (2014-2018). Claire was the committee chair for NACM’s Indigenous midwifery core competencies project and takes an active role in promoting the Competency Framework in Indigenous-led midwifery education and return of birth to Indigenous communities. 

Claire is committed to the growth of Indigenous midwifery in Canada, she has presented at numerous national and international conferences on the role of Indigenous midwives in women’s and community health. Claire completed her Master of Arts in Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies at York University where her research focused on decolonized health care and Indigenous midwifery. Claire is particularly interested in the contributions of Indigenous midwifery to Indigenous sovereignty. 

Claire is dedicated to Indigenous midwifery education, she has been a contract lecturer at the Toronto Metropolitan University Midwifery Education Program since 2018, her teaching focuses on Indigenous midwifery and social justice issues in midwifery. Claire has supported Indigenous students through their midwifery education as the Aboriginal Student coordinator for the Toronto Metropolitan University Midwifery Education, Claire is deeply committed to the increase in diversity in the midwifery profession through Indigenous-led education. Claire is thankful to live and work on the traditional territory of the Anishnawbe, Haudenasonee, Huron-Wendat, and Mississaugas of the New Credit people, and to be a part of the urban Indigenous community of Toronto that so many diverse Indigneous people call home.

  • Aspen Ideas Spotlight Health, Global Health Scholar, 2018
  • Canadian Graduate Scholarship, 2017
  • Iewirokwas Cape Award for Midwifery Heros, 2017

  • MWF108 Aboriginal Childbearing / Indigenous Midwifery
  • MWF11B Social Justice in Midwifery 
  • MWF250 Midwifery Clinical Skills

  • Indigneous midwifery education
  • Indigenous feminism
  • Decolonial approaches to health care
  • Cultural safety in health care provider education programs

  • Hickey S, Roe Y, Ireland S, Kildea S …Dion-Fletcher C et al. (2021). A call for action that cannot go to voicemail: Research activism to urgently improve Indigenous perinatal health and wellbeing. Women and Birth, 34(4), 303-305.
  • Metheny N, Dion Fletcher C. An Environmental Scan of Indigenous Cultural Safety in Canadian Baccalaureate Nursing and Midwifery Programs. (2021) Can J Nurs Res., 53(3) May 21. doi: 10.1177/08445621211016143.
  • Booth, D. & Dion Fletcher, C. (2017). Welcoming future generations: Culturally safe and competent care throughout the ceremony of birth. Assembly of First Nations Health Bulletin, Summer 2017. 
  • Dion Fletcher, C. & Bourgeois, C. (2015). Refusing Delinquency, Reclaiming Power: Indigenous Women and Childbirth. In Natal Signs: Cultural Representations of Pregnancy, Birth and Parenting ed. Nadya Burton. Toronto: Demeter Press.