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Student Health and Wellbeing Strategy

Approved - 24 October 2018

Overarching Objective:

We will enhance our students’ experience at Nottingham by creating a sustainable, consistent and empowering University culture where integrated, holistic health and wellbeing support helps students to make their own informed choices – developing their confidence, knowledge and resilience so that they can be successful during their studies and continue to thrive post-graduation.

Thematic areas

Healthy Campus Community

A healthy University culture is one where staff and students treat each other with respect and support each other to achieve great things. This can only be created by supporting the members of that community to develop their knowledge, understanding and behaviours. We acknowledge the importance of healthy relationships as a vital component of health and wellbeing, and the University will work to ensure that all members of our community feel included, supported, respected, and valued.

Examples of activities, interventions or initiatives that would be captured, measured, and reported against under this theme:

• Activities that increase sense of belonging and emphasise the importance of community
• Educational activity to support healthy personal relationships
• Integration of international students and the challenges they face - i.e. projects like Global Buddies
• Open and varied programme that provide social opportunities
• Peer support networks
• Projects aimed at developing positive social interactions built on respect for diversity and reduction of inappropriate behaviours including harassment and assault
• Role modelling (peer to peer, staff to staff, staff to student, student to student etc.)
• Staff training and development (including PDPR process) to build capacity and confidence of staff to support wellbeing;

Healthy Environment

The homes students live in. The campuses they learn, exercise, socialise and relax on. The spaces that they study in. The University recognises the fundamental importance of environment and will provide a setting that maximises wellbeing by building on our internationally-recognised commitment to sustainability and making the most of our unparalleled parkland campuses.

Examples of activities, interventions or initiatives that would be captured, measured, and reported against under this theme:

• Consideration of health and wellbeing in building projects
• Encouraging increased cycle use and walking whilst reducing vehicle usage
• Maximising usage of Sports facilities (particularly David Ross Sports Village)
• Pastoral care in Halls and Off-Campus welfare support
• Use of the estate to promote wellbeing
• Visible signs and signals of a community that values health and wellbeing

Healthy Learning Experience

In order to be successful in their academic studies, students need to feel safe and supported. The University will ensure that consideration of health and wellbeing is an integrated part of academic decision making.

Examples of activities, interventions or initiatives that would be captured, measured, and reported against under this theme:

• Education and curriculum development
• Equality Impact Assessments and related documents
• Healthy study habits
• Learner analytics
• Peer mentoring
• Personal tutor support
• Recognising and responding to peak stress points
• Reducing stress points within the academic calendar
• Resilience workshops

Healthy Lifestyle

Positive and consistent engagement with physical activity aids in the success of a student’s individual and professional achievements. The University will support students in making easy-to-manage, informed decisions about their lifestyle habits – providing a range of services and interventions that can help them make healthier choices which encourage the embedding physical activity and the commitment to new behaviours where students have made a decision to change their lifestyle. This work will build on the existing strengths of the Sports and Physical Activities department and the HealthyU campaign

Examples of activities, interventions or initiatives that would be captured, measured, and reported against under this theme:

• Advice about sleep and rest
• Alcohol, tobacco, drugs reduction campaigning and support
• Cripps Health Centre: GP registration and service promotions
• Diet and nutrition support – including support for eating disorders
• Financial health support
• Physical activities such as UoN sport membership offers, and the range of programmes and projects students can partake including: Engage, Leadership, IMS, Sports clubs, Performance sport, disability referral process, inclusive programs
• Student health and communicable disease activity (including occupational health and vaccination)

Healthy Mental Wellbeing

For everyone, our mental wellbeing is dynamic and can change regularly, impacting significantly on our productivity and our capacity to perform to the best of our abilities. Different challenges are experienced at different times in the student lifecycle. The University acknowledges the need to look after our communities in this area, and will ensure that a whole university approach is adopted to meet this challenge, building on existing high-quality services in Student Welfare.

Examples of activities, interventions or initiatives that would be captured, measured, and reported against under this theme:

• Building resilience and promotion of protective factors
• Healthy U mental health campaigning
• Mental Health Advisory Service
• Mental Health First Aid
• University Counselling Service activities

It is recognised that some services, initiatives, or projects may span across a range of headings. For the sake of clear reporting interventions will be placed against one specific heading but reference to other related headings will be included in the intervention description.

Underpinning principles – cutting across each of the thematic areas

Collaboration, cohesion and consistency

Actions need to be delivered consistently across the institution and must be aligned with our values. All areas of the University (including the Students’ Union) should work together to ensure contradictory messages are removed and resources and opportunities are maximised.

Education

Interventions and initiatives should not simply fall into the category of specialist services that are served to students. All members of our community have a personal responsibility for their own wellbeing. Empowering students to develop their understanding of their own health and wellbeing should be a core consideration when creating support activities. This will enable students to increase their knowledge base and build their own levels of resilience.

Research

It is vital that the University gathers evidence on what a healthy work culture actually looks like whilst also continuing to monitor and measure the outcomes from existing interventions and initiatives. Continuous review and learning from inside and outside of the University should inform yearly planning of activities and help to target areas for development.

Visible to all

The support available for students will be clearly communicated and easily accessible to students and staff members.

Spectrum of intervention

To ensure we create a holistic health and wellbeing culture we need to develop a range of responses to best address concerns and ensure issues do not escalate and become greater concerns. Therefore, projects, initiatives, and services will be considered as a part of a spectrum of interventions – helping us to identify where more resource or more emphasis is required. The below table gives examples of the types of interventions currently in place within the institution and where they fit within this spectrum:

 

A more visual representation of the service and activity mapping is available (pdf).