
The SHALON Method™
A Community-Centered Approach to Advancing Black Maternal Health
The SHALON Method™ is a comprehensive initiative of Dr. Shalon’s Maternal Action Project (DSMap), designed to transform the conditions surrounding Black maternal health through a culturally grounded, community-driven approach. The SHALON method calls in systems, families, and communities to act with urgency and care.
Core Components of the SHALON Method™
1. SHALON Blueprint: Anti-Bias & Cultural Humility Training
A research-informed training program built for healthcare providers, social workers, and allied professionals.
Focus: Uncovering and addressing implicit bias, systemic inequities, and structural racism
Tools: Self-assessment via the Mirror Exercise, case-based learning, and reflective dialogue
Goal: Equip professionals with actionable skills to see patients as people first and build trust
A healing-centered gathering that brings together families, advocates, providers, and policymakers.
Purpose: Reimagine maternal health through conversation, connection, and collective visioning
Audience: Intergenerational; includes youth, elders, and the broader community
Offerings: Story-sharing, healing spaces, policy dialogue, and resource mobilization
3. GRAMMS: Grandmothers Rallying Against Maternal Mortality Sisterhood
A program supporting women who’ve lost daughters, sisters, or loved ones due to pregnancy-related complications.
Support: Emotional wellness, peer community, and monthly workshops
Education: Legal preparedness, parenting guidance, advocacy tools
Advocacy: Empowering women to become system-changers and storytellers
4. Community-Based Research and Evaluation
In partnership with academic institutions, DSMap ensures that community voices shape and assess all SHALON Method™ activities.
Approach: Trauma-informed, equity-centered, participatory
Framework: Based on Alinsky’s theory of change
Objective: Measure the impact and refine interventions without making participants feel like test subjects
What Makes the SHALON Method™ Different
Built by and for Black women and families
Integrates grief work, healing, accountability, and advocacy
Refuses to pathologize or criminalize pain—instead, we humanize and organize