Ray Campbell believes there’s no such thing as too much of a good thing when it comes to Pregnancy Help Institute.
Heartbeat International has offered an executive-caliber intensive week of training, resources, networking, and tools to form thousands of pregnancy help personnel via its annual Pregnancy Help Institute since 2007.
Heartbeat International is the largest network of pregnancy help organizations both globally and in the U.S., with affiliate pregnancy centers, pregnancy medical clinics, non-profit adoption agencies, and maternity homes in more than 90 countries.
Tracks offered at Pregnancy Help Institute include Development, New Director, and Leadership, and the LOVE Approach Ultrasound Clinical, offered for ultrasonography professionals.
Along with the rigorous training and content, Pregnancy Help Institute gives the opportunity for pregnancy help personnel to connect with one another, have fellowship, and develop lasting relationships. Faith and prayer are woven throughout the week.
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Campbell is Executive Director with Life Choices Pregnancy Care Center in Columbus, Miss., and has the unique status of having attended each of the Pregnancy Help Institute tracks available to him. He took part in the Development Track again this year, happy to learn from an updated curriculum and faculty.
It was not in his career plan to become a pregnancy center director. He’d actually been a high school teacher for 16 years when the opportunity with Life Choices came up.
“Of course, I was pro-life,” he told Pregnancy Help News. “I am a believer in life, but I wasn't really sure what the pregnancy center aspect held and what it looked like from that direction.”
“The more I learned about it, the more I became aware of it, the more that I just fell in love with it,” said Campbell. “Because it is truly being the hands and feet of Jesus Christ and reaching out to your community and showing them the love of Jesus Christ.”
After teaching high school Campbell became an activities director, teaching team- building skills at a Christian camp and retreat center for four years. And then Life Choices reached out and asked if he would come and interview for the job because of his communication skills and background. His education degree had an emphasis in communications.
The Board of Directors for Life Choices was familiar with Campbell because he had taught some of their children in school and he had also attended church with some of the board members.
“So, they wanted me basically to come in and be able to go out into the community, talk about Life Choices and bring awareness to the ministry and what it was all about,” Campbell said.
His mother was a volunteer mentor for several years at the pregnancy help center, but that was the only direct connection that he had prior to joining the center.
Campbell has embraced his role in pregnancy help for its significance in impacting lives.
“We get to use the platform of pregnancy help in order to share the gospel,” he said. “At Life Choices, we believe the core of our foundation is the gospel and sharing the gospel. And we get to people who are in need, who are suffering, who don't feel any hope or support during their pregnancy.”
“We get them to be the hands of feet of Jesus Christ by offering to meet a physical need, but also feeding into their spiritual need,” he added. “And that's what I was all about. I'm a big relationship person. I love missions anyway. And what I came to realize at Working at Life Choices is that you don't have to go overseas to find missions, you can find missions in your own backyard.”
A few of the board members encouraged him to begin investing in training, which led to his first week of Pregnancy Help Institute as a new director.
“When I found the Pregnancy Help Institute and the New Directors track, I thought, this is great,” Campbell said.
He found the intensive week to be greatly beneficial.
“You are in that New Director's Track for a week, and you are immersed in it for a week with a smaller class,” he said.
What’s brought him back for subsequent Pregnancy Help Institutes is the personal nature of the training and the intense focus for a full week, along with the networking.
Tweet This: It is well worth the investment to come to this for me as a director to learn all that I can- Center director about Pregnancy Help Institute
“So, after the first year, I knew that this was the place, this week at Pregnancy Help Institute is where I wanted to come to continue training,” Campbell said.
Then he saw the Development Track and knew that, because he didn’t come from a fundraising background, and he does wear the development hat as well at his center, that it would be of benefit.
“Plus, I had, through the first Pregnancy Help Institute come to meet many people, many other directors from all around the states, and they all talked about the Development Track and how good it was,” said Campbell.
“And so, I was like, well, if y'all learned a lot from it, then I can learn a lot from it,” he said. “And so, I came back and learned a lot from it.”
“I began implementing a lot of things that I was taught in development and started seeing the increase, the reward of what I had learned and what was taught and taking that and using that in my center.”
This drew him to return for the Leadership Track.
“In Development I had heard so much about the Leadership Track and just how much everybody that had taken the Leadership Track had really gleaned from it,” he said.
Campbell said he loves leadership and believes it is a quality he has but that one can always grow in it.
“I was excited and went to Leadership last year, and it was phenomenal,” he said.
Campbell believes he grew as a leader after attending and he has been able to look at his team, understand their strengths and weaknesses, understand his strengths and weaknesses, and how they work together, and how to train and lead his staff.
“I loved the Leadership Track,” Campbell said.
He joked toward the end of the week that Heartbeat would have to come up with another track for him to attend. It just happened that a new Media Track was planned. Campbell registered. The new track had to be postponed due to scheduling issues, and Campbell opted for Development another time this year.
“Because new people were teaching it, I knew I'd learn something new in it,” he said. “And yes, I'm excited to be learning a lot of refresher things. A lot of things motivated me to go back and get started again with development.”
“I was still learning, even though it was my second time through Development,” said Campbell.
Campbell told Pregnancy Help News it was well worth the investment to attend Pregnancy Help Institute in each of the tracks and to even repeat the one track.
He believes for the money spent, attendees get a lot if information, a lot of training, and a lot more to take home. And then there is the networking.
“I've made lifelong friends that live in other states, other directors who I've reached out to who have helped me tremendously,” Campbell said.
“Especially after that new Development Track,” he said. “I would call them or email them and say, hey, can you send me what you do for job descriptions? What do your policies and procedures look like? And through those networks, we've been able to trade information and help one another as we've gone along.”
Campbell commends the instructors at Pregnancy Help Institute.
“The intentionality that you're getting through the instructors is well worth it,” he said. “Because again, it's knowledge and information that I believe it is invaluable.”
“To put a price on it, it is hard to say,” he added.
“I'd spend the money here,” Campbell said. “It is well worth the investment to come to this for me personally as a director to learn all that I can.”
Heartbeat's 2025 Pregnancy Help Institute will be July 21-25 in Columbus, Ohio.
Editor's note: Heartbeat International manages Pregnancy Help News.
