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A bespoke platform that enables universities to improve health and wellbeing on campus
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An unprecedented global network of best practices, successful projects and knowledge
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A holistic view of fitness, including mental health, nutrition, social responsibility and sustainability
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100 projects that universities can develop to obtain the Healthy Campus Label certification
LAUSANNE, Switzerland – It’s finally here! After months of exhaustive preparations and expert inputs from around the world, the highly awaited FISU Healthy Campus project opens to all universities on 12 May – aiming to positively impact the lifestyles and wellbeing of millions of university students around the world, by encouraging physical activity and healthy choices on campuses.
“Through this project, FISU will provide a unique and very important tool to universities around the world to promote the values of physical activity, health and nutrition among their student community,” says FISU President Oleg Matytsin.
“This project is really like a bridge between elite sport and the larger student community. Every year, there may be 10,000 or 20,000 athletes who participate in our events but there are more than 150 million university students across the globe.”
FISU Secretary General-CEO Eric Saintrond also noted that the role and reach of university sports extends well beyond competitions and elite athletes.
“Through this project, we have found a way to extend our activities to all students; not just elite student-athletes,” says Saintrond. “We believe that FISU has a very important social responsibility and we want to reach millions of students.”
“There are more than 40,000 universities in the world. Even if we reach only 1% of them at the beginning, we will still be reaching 400-500 universities, across five continents,” continues Saintrond.
“To start, we can engage with millions of students around the world with just one percent of universities. We do not see this as a short or even medium-term project. This is a long-term investment in the future of our societies.”
Seven major world universities have already been part of the development process, acting as pilot universities for the project. They are: University of Western Australia, Universidad Nacional de La Matanza in Argentina, University of Turin in Italy, Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (RUDN), Peking University in China, University of Lausanne (UNIL) in Switzerland and University of Johannesburg in South Africa.
“The real strength of this programme, is the holistic view of wellbeing in every aspect across the entire campus community,” says Prof. Tshilidzi Marwala, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Johannesburg. “This will help us as a university to stress the importance of healthy lifestyles to our community and to share and learn best practices”.
The programme is officially open to all universities in the world through the launch, on 12 May, of the official www.fisuhealthycampus.sport platform, developed by Lausanne-based Katapult SA. Universities can register on this platform and get access to a global network of best practices, successful projects and knowledge. Also on the platform, universities will find the ‘Standard Document’ with detailed information and scientific criteria to earn a ‘Healthy Campus Label’.
“With the technical and scientific support from more than 30 recognised international experts in the field of health, we have developed a reference and standards document that will enable universities to be certified,” says Fernando Parente, Director of the FISU Healthy Campus programme. “This document contains 100 criteria to develop programmes aimed at obtaining the FISU Healthy Campus Label.”
While the objective of registration in the first year will be to earn the certification through implementation of health and fitness programmes, from the second year onwards, the FISU Healthy Campus Label will be awarded at five levels: Certified, Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum.
In order to cater to the broad demands of universities and campus communities, the Healthy Campus programme functions across six domains; Sport and Physical Activity, Mental and Social Health, Nutrition, Disease Prevention, Risk Behaviour, and Environment, Sustainability and Social Responsibility. The universities will be evaluated on an additional seventh criteria; their management of the Healthy Campus project.
“With this Healthy Campus project FISU is going several steps ahead from being an organiser of sports and education events to actually taking social responsibility for universities and students,” concludes FISU President Oleg Matytsin.
For more information on the FISU Healthy Campus project, please write to healthy.campus@fisu.net.
Did you know?
FISU is supporting the World Health Organisation’s #WalkTheTalk campaign that urges people to increase their physical activity and promotes #HealthForAll. Watch out for more information including a photo contest, on our social media. And find out more here. –>
