It takes a village to raise a child—especially right here in the fast-paced climate of Silicon Valley. Riya Dhaliwal became acutely aware of this when she left her tech career in 2022 and transitioned into motherhood. Dhaliwal recognized that the drive to achieve in the work world can be met with compromise. Her response? Creating New Mom School in Los Gatos.
New Mom School was originally founded in Newport, down in Southern California, as a postnatal education and support program.
Dhaliwal’s location here is the first one in NorCal.
They rely on evidence-based education and match moms with one another based on babies’ birth months, with different cohorts for the whole first year of postpartum.
Each week, there’s a new developmentally-appropriate topic scheduled. They bring in experts, such as OBGYNs, pediatricians and psychiatrists. They opened on Aug. 12, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by mayor Matthew Hudes. They’ve already taken on four separate groups of 14 mothers and their babies. They’ve already had more than 100 clients register.
Alexandra Spritz founded New Mom School over 12 years ago when she recognized the need for postpartum services. They now have more than 30 locations across the US.
”They don’t have that village built in, and we’re helping create that community’
—Riya Dhaliwal, owner
“Moms have on average 12-15 appointments throughout their prenatal care,” Dhaliwal said. “And when it comes to postpartum, there’s really only about one.” She explains the work of New Mom School is tailored towards providing care not just for babies, but their mothers as well.
“Eighty-five percent of postpartum moms experience postpartum distress, and one out of seven develop postpartum depression,” Dhaliwal said, adding more than half of that goes untreated.
There are four core programs that New Mom School offers: For newborns (0-3 months), second time mom (0-3 months), infant (3-6 months), and rising toddler (6-12 months). They meet each week for a total of eight weeks. Dhaliwal herself is a mother of two—aged three and eight months.
Dhaliwal says that New Mom School helps curate a sense of community by building a village, which she believes has been lost in motherhood.
“Especially in this area, we’re in the heart of Silicon Valley, and a lot of people move here for work, so there are a lot of transplants with a high immigration population,” she said. “They don’t have that village built in, and we’re helping create that community and village for them.”
Dhaliwal spent 15 years in health tech before transitioning into the maternal health space when she was navigating her own care.
Working in the industry for so long, she says when she became a mom for the first time, in 2022, she was shocked by the lack of resources that were available.
Prior to opening New Mom School, Dhaliwal ran her own doula operation.
The support service helped pregnant and post-partum women navigate their care in California.
Part of a doula’s job is to help people navigate birth and postpartum issues, and to help expecting moms prepare for motherhood.
A modern business, an ancient need
Historically, children were not just raised by parents but by a community, with the surrounding village to assist with childrearing.
New Mom School wants to model this by implementing a business model where new moms begin with a community—via a class of 14 moms and their babies.
One thing Dhaliwal noticed as she went through her pregnancy was that hospitals typically offered virtual lactation groups.
In contrast to this industry standard, Dhaliwal offers free breast feeding support groups every Tuesday at 1pm, where she brings in an in-house lactation consultant.
“For me, it was more about community support,” she said. “I moved to the Bay Area for work where I found my now-husband, and I was really looking for other people that had kids the same age.”
This realization was sparked by the struggles that followed her first birth.
“I had an identity crisis,” Dhaliwal said. “Nobody talks about that, especially for career-driven women that now want to start a family as well. I craved a vetted health plan, plus the community, is what I craved. And those are the aspects that we combine here.”
Many expecting moms prepare for birth, but they may not prepare for postpartum.
And they don’t always have people supporting them with information about what’s next—until they are in it.
“We talk about the hard things—like identity and attachment issues—because many moms don’t have the immediate joy and we address that,” she said. “We don’t give anecdotal advice; we bring in experts to talk about it and facilitate the one-on-one introduction.”
Dhaliwal says she has her eye on other locations around Silicon Valley (the next being Palo Alto in early 2026).
Topics that are covered in the classes are: transition to motherhood, soothing your fussy baby, postpartum anxiety accompanied with a mental health therapist, the back-to-work transition, the postpartum body, and relationship dynamics after the baby.
As the South Bay acts as Dhaliwal’s territory, she says that opening in town first was due to how she sees Los Gatos as a health care hub. Dhaliwal is proud of her team. She notes that, outside of the flagship location in Newport, Los Gatos has the highest registration for opening. This reflects the demand in the area, she adds. “I want this to be a centralized hub and resource for new parents,” she said. “We are looking at workshops outside of our core curriculum.”
