Graduate Midwife Eligibility

To be eligible for the Programme, graduate midwives must meet the following criteria:

• have New Zealand Citizenship or Permanent Residency
• hold a midwifery degree from a New Zealand pre-registration midwifery education programme accredited by the Midwifery Council of New Zealand (the ‘Midwifery Council’), awarded no longer than one year prior to commencement on the Programme
• hold registration with the Midwifery Council within the Midwifery Scope of Practice and have a current Annual Practicing Certificate
• have practiced as a registered midwife for less than six months before commencing the Programme and meet the Midwifery Council’s graduate midwife profile
• be working as a publicly funded Lead Maternity Care (LMC) or employed as a midwife by a District Health Board (DHB) or private maternity service provider
• if employed by a DHB or private maternity service provider, must be working a minimum of 32 hours per week (0.8 FTE)
• if working as an LMC, must have a minimum caseload of one woman on programme commencement and a total caseload of approximately 30 women across the Programme duration.

Graduate midwives will be required to attend a one day graduate workshop.

Mentor Midwife Eligibility

To be eligible for the Programme, mentor midwives must have been named by a graduate midwife as her MFYP mentor midwife and meet the following criteria

• be registered with the Midwifery Council, be ‘in good standing’ and with no restrictions on that registration that would negatively impact on her ability to be a mentor
• have a Midwifery Council Annual Practicing Certificate and be working within the Midwifery Scope of Practice
• have successfully completed the NZCOM Preliminary Mentoring workshop (the Practicalities of Being a Mentor Midwife)
• have significant midwifery experience across the Midwifery Scope of Practice i.e. have practised as a midwife for at least three years and preferably at the level (or equivalent) of Leadership Domain within the Quality and Leadership Programme (as outlined in the Multi Employer Collective Agreement), and
• have met all requirements of the  Midwifery Council Recertification programme over the previous three years.

These midwives are then required to attend a MFYP 2-day mentor development workshop (or one day update workshop for returning mentors) and support meetings scheduled across the Programme year. This workshop covers the Programme components and the mentor role in relation to those, the templates that the graduate and mentors have to complete, mentorship in practice, negotiating relationships, how communication and learning styles influence and impact on reflective practice and critical thinking, and opportunities to give and receive feedback.

Mentor Midwife Pre-requisite Workshop 'The Practicalities of Being a Mentor'

One of the MFYP mentor eligibility criteria required by the Clinical Training Agency (the CTA, the business unit within the Ministry of Health funding the Programme), is that mentor midwives must have completed the New Zealand College of Midwives preliminary mentoring workshop called 'The Practicalities of Being a Mentor'. 

This one day workshop has been designed to provide midwives with the opportunity to share and discuss their own experiences of being mentored or mentoring, and to explore the principles and practicalities of being a mentor.  It also helps clarify the differences between mentoring, preceptoring and clinical supervision.  This workshop is not funded by the MFYP Programme.

For information and dates for this workshop in 2008 click here.