Julie Bays has been teaching prenatal classes in Toronto for more than 20 years. She held long tenures at both Women's College Hospital and Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, and has guided hundreds of families through birth prep, baby care, and the questions that keep people up at night.

Her style is direct and unhurried. She explains things plainly, adapts to how each person in the room learns, and does not judge a single question. She also does something a lot of educators skip: she gets the group talking to each other. The people sitting beside you in week one tend to be the people you are still texting at 2am.

Earlier in her career, Julie attended many births as a doula, though she no longer practices in that capacity. She has three children of her own, and for 11 years she and her husband fostered seven newborns through Toronto Children's Aid, some for a few months and others for more than two years. She has called The Junction home for over 21 years.

Julie teaches Body Co's Birth Education classes, small in-person cohorts that get you and your partner ready for birth and those first weeks at home with a newborn.