Our Impact

Healthy Minds | Healthy Campuses is a community of practice involving members from post-secondary institutions across British Columbia

This learning community brings together students, service staff, faculty, and administrators from the campuses along with research and support staff funded by BC Partners to promote mental health and healthier relationships with psychoactive substances.

Caring

From its beginnings in 2004, Healthy Minds | Healthy Campuses has focused on building positive relationships on campus and between campuses. The initial participants were counselling staff from four campuses. As the initiative gained momentum, the project promoted the building of multi-disciplinary networks on individual campuses and to link these into a province-wide community.

Recently, members of the community reflected on Healthy Minds | Healthy Campuses as a caring community. They said things like:

• “On our home campuses we come up against forces that bump up against the work we are trying to do. Within the HM|HC community, I feel validated and supported.”
• “It is comforting to have a place where I can reach out when I need support.”
• “Caring in HM|HC is expressed by creating spaces where I can feel safe to express my opinions, to ask questions.”

Sharing

Healthy Minds | Healthy Campuses has become a community known for its generosity of sharing. As one member put it, “you can’t help but share.” This sharing happens at multiple levels. Members come together at events and are generous in sharing their contact information with each other. They often call or email each other to discuss ideas or get support in dealing with challenges on their own campuses. The community has also developed a culture of sharing the ideas and resources developed on individual campuses so they can be used or adapted by other campuses. See, for example, First-person accounts of culture shifts at Selkirk College, Do2GetThru and Community Cooking Workshops.

Learning

Above all, Healthy Minds | Healthy Campuses is a vibrant learning community that represents all publically funded post-secondary institutions in BC. Members value the opportunity to work with others, share ideas and be exposed to different perspectives.