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Pre-registration Midwifery Education

Pre-registration midwifery education programmes are three-year bachelor's degree programmes. They are designed to prepare students for registration as a midwife in New Zealand.

Approved programmes may be offered by accredited tertiary education providers. At the present time approved programmes must meet the following minimum requirements as set by the Nursing Council of New Zealand and adopted by the Midwifery Council in 2004:

Specified theory and clinical content
Continuity of care clinical experiences
1500 hours theory (minimum)
1500 hours clinical (minimum)
Facilitation of 30 births (minimum)

The Midwifery Council has completed an extensive review of the pre-registration programmes and has developed new national standards for these programmes and a national curriculum framework. Issues concerning accreditation and funding has still to be resolved but the council expects that the new programmes will be in place in 2009 or 2010, depending on the school.

Midwifery students must successfully complete an approved pre-registration midwifery education programme and meet the criteria listed above, in order to be put forward for the Midwifery Council National Midwifery Examination, which is part of the Council's registration requirements for New Zealand midwives.

There are five accredited tertiary education providers currently offering approved pre-registration midwifery education degree programmes. These are:

Otago Polytechnic (Dunedin)

Christchurch Polytecnic Institute of Technology (Christchurch)

Massey University (Wellington)

Waikato Institute of Technology (Hamilton)

Auckland University of Technology (Auckland)

Clicking on the links above will take you to the institution's School of Midwifery page.