At the heart of Frontier Nursing University is a talented and diverse community of students, alumni, faculty, staff, couriers and preceptors. Spotlight blogs feature members of our FNU community who are focused on the mission of educating nurse-midwives and nurse practitioners to deliver quality healthcare to underserved and rural populations.
Since 2002, FNU graduate April Clyde, CNM has dreamed of opening a birth center in her community of Las Vegas, Nevada. After years of gaining experience, pursuing higher education and advocating for new legislation in Nevada to accommodate midwives, her dream finally came true nearly 10 years later.
In 2021, Clyde opened Serenity Birth Center, which is Nevada’s first and only freestanding birth center. Clyde said that Serenity Birth Center upholds a woman’s autonomy in making informed choices about her healthcare and her baby’s healthcare, in alignment with her personal values and beliefs. The center also extends an invitation to the woman’s self-defined family to participate in the pregnancy, birth, and postpartum phases.
“Birth centers are an integrated part of the healthcare system and are guided by principles of prevention, sensitivity, safety, appropriate medical intervention and cost-effectiveness,” Clyde said.
Inspired to Open a Birth Center During Frontier Bound
Clyde’s journey began in 2000 when she began working as a labor and delivery nurse after earning her Bachelors in Nursing from the University of Nevada Las Vegas.
“I loved the work.” she said. “At the same time, I also craved more autonomy and to be involved from the beginning of pregnancy.”
Clyde enrolled at FNU to earn her Nurse-Midwifery Post-Graduate Certificate. She was initially inspired to open a birth center while at Frontier Bound in 2002, where she met the late Kitty Ernst, a leader in the nurse-midwifery movement in the U.S.
“I told her how much our community needed a birth center,” Clyde said. “She took both my hands in hers and looked directly into my eyes and said, ‘then you will need to open one.’ If Kitty thought that I should and that I could open a birth center, then I better get to work!”
Clyde graduated from FNU in 2004 as a member of CNEP Class 36. She said the university was an ideal choice for obtaining her post-graduate certificate.
“Frontier has such a rich history,” she said. “I also needed a distance education program as leaving my community wasn’t an option. Frontier was a perfect match.”
That same year, Clyde began working as a CNM with a group hospital practice. She was the only CNM at the hospital, which she said gave her the opportunity to exemplify the midwifery model of care. In 2006, she began providing care for home births to families who had previously given birth with her in the hospital. The next year, she began serving as a preceptor for FNU and currently employs two FNU alumni that she precepted.
Advocating for Nurse-Midwives in Nevada
Clyde opened her own birth practice, Baby’s 1st Day, in 2008. During this time, APRNs initiated efforts to alter the laws in Nevada to permit them to practice at the full extent of their education and without mandatory supervision from a physician. This endeavor proved successful in 2012. Subsequently, Clyde collaborated with fellow FNU graduate Melinda Hoskins to bring about modifications to the birth center laws in Nevada, allowing midwives to establish and manage them. The legislation was passed in 2018, and the following year, they commenced the construction of Serenity Birth Center.
Since opening, Serenity Birth Center has offered pre-conception, pregnancy care, and labor and delivery/postpartum care, along with women’s care services.
“We offer another choice in childbirth for Las Vegas,” Clyde said.
To this day, Clyde said she continues to stay in contact with many of her former classmates at FNU.
“Midwives are a generous bunch,” she said. “I have had lots of help from other CNEP grads.”
In her free time, Clyde enjoys spending time with her family, gardening, practicing yoga and traveling.
Thank you, April, for your demonstration of the distinctive expertise and enthusiasm possessed by FNU graduates through the care you provide for Nevada families.
Read more in Why Should I Become a Nurse Midwife?
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Carrie Belin is an experienced board-certified Family Nurse Practitioner and a graduate of the Johns Hopkins DNP program, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Georgetown University School of Nursing, and Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. She has also completed fellowships at Georgetown and the University of California Irvine.
Angie has been a full-scope midwife since 2009. She has experience in various birth settings including home, hospital, and birth centers. She is committed to integrating the midwifery model of care in the US. She completed her master’s degree in nurse-midwifery at Frontier Nursing University (FNU) and her Doctorate at Johns Hopkins University. She currently serves as the midwifery clinical faculty at FNU. Angie is motivated by the desire to improve the quality of healthcare and has led quality improvement projects on skin-to-skin implementation, labor induction, and improving transfer of care practices between hospital and community midwives. In 2017, she created a short film on skin-to-skin called 
Justin C. Daily, BSN, RN, has ten years of experience in nursing. At the start of his nursing career, Justin worked as a floor nurse on the oncology floor at St. Francis. He then spent two years as the Director of Nursing in a small rural Kansas hospital before returning to St. Francis and the oncology unit. He has been in his current position as the Chemo Nurse Educator for the past four years. He earned an Associate in Nurse from Hutchinson Community College and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Bethel College.
Brandy Jackson serves as the Director of Undergraduate Nursing Programs and Assistant Educator at Wichita State University and Co-Director of Access in Nursing. Brandy is a seasoned educator with over 15 years of experience. Before entering academia, Brandy served in Hospital-based leadership and Critical Care Staff nurse roles. Brandy is passionate about equity in nursing education with a focus on individuals with disabilities. Her current research interests include accommodations of nursing students with disabilities in clinical learning environments and breaking down barriers for historically unrepresented individuals to enter the nursing profession. Brandy is also actively engaged in Interprofessional Education development, creating IPE opportunities for faculty and students at Wichita State. Brandy is an active member of Wichita Women for Good and Soroptimist, with the goal to empower women and girls. Brandy is a TeamSTEPPS master trainer. She received the DASIY Award for Extraordinary Nursing Faculty in 2019 at Wichita State University. 
Dr. Sabrina Ali Jamal-Eddine is an Arab-disabled queer woman of color with a PhD in Nursing and an interdisciplinary certificate in Disability Ethics from the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC). Dr. Jamal-Eddine’s doctoral research explored spoken word poetry as a form of critical narrative pedagogy to educate nursing students about disability, ableism, and disability justice. Dr. Jamal-Eddine now serves as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in UIC’s Department of Disability and Human Development and serves on the Board of Directors of the National Organization of Nurses with Disabilities (NOND). During her doctoral program, Sabrina served as a Summer Fellow at a residential National Endowment of the Humanities (NEH) Summer Institute at Arizona State University (2023), a summer fellow at Andrew W. Mellon’s National Humanities Without Walls program at University of Michigan (2022), a Summer Research Fellow at UC Berkeley’s Othering & Belonging Institute (2021), and an Illinois Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and related Disabilities (LEND) trainee (2019-2020).
Vanessa Cameron works for Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nursing Education & Professional Development. She is also attending George Washington University and progressing towards a PhD in Nursing with an emphasis on ableism in nursing. After becoming disabled in April 2021, Vanessa’s worldview and perspective changed, and a recognition of the ableism present within healthcare and within the culture of nursing was apparent. She has been working since that time to provide educational foundations for nurses about disability and ableism, provide support for fellow disabled nursing colleagues, and advocate for the disabled community within healthcare settings to reduce disparities.
Dr. Lucinda Canty is a certified nurse-midwife, Associate Professor of Nursing, and Director of the Seedworks Health Equity in Nursing Program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing from Columbia University, a master’s degree from Yale University, specializing in nurse-midwifery, and a PhD from the University of Connecticut. Dr. Canty has provided reproductive health care for over 29 years. Her research interests include the prevention of maternal mortality and severe maternal morbidity, reducing racial and ethnic health disparities in reproductive health, promoting diversity in nursing, and eliminating racism in nursing and midwifery.
Dr. Lisa Meeks is a distinguished scholar and leader whose unwavering commitment to inclusivity and excellence has significantly influenced the landscape of health professions education and accessibility. She is the founder and executive director of the DocsWithDisabilities Initiative and holds appointments as an Associate Professor in the Departments of Learning Health Sciences and Family Medicine at the University of Michigan.
Dr. Nikia Grayson, DNP, MSN, MPH, MA, CNM, FNP-C, FACNM (she/her) is a trailblazing force in reproductive justice, blending her expertise as a public health activist, anthropologist, and family nurse-midwife to champion the rights and health of underserved communities. Graduating with distinction from Howard University, Nikia holds a bachelor’s degree in communications and a master’s degree in public health. Her academic journey also led her to the University of Memphis, where she earned a master’s in medical anthropology, and the University of Tennessee, where she achieved both a master’s in nursing and a doctorate in nursing practice. Complementing her extensive education, she completed a post-master’s certificate in midwifery at Frontier Nursing University.
Dr. Tia Brown McNair is the Vice President in the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Student Success and Executive Director for the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Centers at the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) in Washington, DC. She oversees both funded projects and AAC&U’s continuing programs on equity, inclusive excellence, high-impact practices, and student success. McNair directs AAC&U’s Summer Institutes on High-Impact Practices and Student Success, and TRHT Campus Centers and serves as the project director for several AAC&U initiatives, including the development of a TRHT-focused campus climate toolkit. She is the lead author of From Equity Talk to Equity Walk: Expanding Practitioner Knowledge for Racial Justice in Higher Education (January 2020) and Becoming a Student-Ready College: A New Culture of Leadership for Student Success (July 2016 and August 2022 Second edition).