The Well-being Strategy will be guided by the Okanagan Charter, the National Standard for Mental Health and Well-Being for Post Secondary Students and the National Standard for Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace. These documents will be used to inform future engagement, identify priorities and shape the direction of a future strategy. York is dedicated toward becoming a signatory of the Okanagan Charter and to ensure that well-being is embedded into all aspects of university so that as a community we can all be well together.
Okanagan Charter
The Okanagan Charter is an international charter, this document guides post-secondary institutions across the world to build health promoting university and colleges. The Okanagan charter calls upon post-secondary schools to embed health into all aspects of campus culture and to lead health promotion action and collaboration locally and globally.
York is committed to signaling a formal commitment to supporting well-being on our campuses through an Okanagan Charter Signing event. This commitment sends a powerful message about the type of institution that York aspires to be—one that well-being is central to everything the university does.
Read the Okanagan Charter (PDF in English).
Read the Okanagan Charter (PDF in French).
Mental Health Commission of Canada: National Standard for Mental Health & Well-Being for Post Secondary Students
The National Standard for Mental-Health and Well-Being for Post-Secondary Students is a set of flexible, voluntary guidelines to help post-secondary institutions support the mental health and well-being of students through long-term planning. Following a socioecological model, this standard provides various audit tools and assessments to help guide universities at identifying opportunities to enhance well-being on campus. It is grounded in continuous improvement to support post-secondary institutions with meeting key well-being and mental health outcomes.
The Well-being Strategy is guided by this standard in helping enhance the well-being of all students attending York University. This standard will help with raising awareness about well-being and decrease mental illness related stigma and provide an overall healthier and safer institutional environment for everyone. It is important to provide opportunities for students to succeed and flourish during their post-secondary journey while gaining the life and resiliency skills that students can use at school, at work, and in daily life.
Mental Health Commission of Canada: National Standard for Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace
The National Standard of Canada for Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace consists of a set of voluntary guidelines, tools and resources intended to guide organizations in promoting mental health and preventing psychological harm at work through long-term planning. Following a risk management and harm reduction approach, this standard provides a framework and assessment tools. It is grounded in continuous improvement to help organizations of all types guide current and future efforts in a way to improve psychological health and safety in the workplace.
The Well-being Strategy is guided by this standard as well-being levels directly affect levels of student, staff, faculty and instructor satisfaction, as well as employee engagement.