Healthy Campus

Healthy Campus empowers campus communities to improve health and well-being. It is the process of helping campus communities:

  • Become the cornerstone of the campus by striving toward health equity and eliminating health disparities
  • Support a community that increases academic success, student and faculty/staff retention, and life-long learning
  • Create a culture where social and physical environments promote health

San Jose State University’s Healthy Campus initiative (SJSU Treat Yourself Well) seeks to address impediments to student success by fostering a positive student experience both inside and outside of the classroom while supporting and embracing student well-being. The commitments of SJSU’s Healthy Campus framework are as follows: student success, health, wellness, health promotion, engagement, diversity, and community.

San Jose State University (SJSU) proudly signed on to take the Healthy Campus Pledge in July 2017.  We are the first California State University to join over 50 diverse institutions of higher education, non-profit organizations, and government agencies in the United States and Canada committed to move college campuses toward better health. 

SJSU aims to achieve Healthy Campus goals and objectives through the collaborative efforts of health, academics, student affairs, and administrative colleagues to foster healthy environments and behaviors.   

Health and wellness are top-of-mind issues for our campus.  With Healthy Campus 2020, SJSU joins a growing cohort of colleges and universities nationally in a movement aimed at supporting better health among students, faculty and staff members.  The national affiliation provides to us a broad strategy and practical framework for developing wellness programs uniquely suited to our community’s interest and needs.   

- SJSU President Mary Papazian

SJSU’s Healthy Campus initiative is deeply embedded in the socio-ecological model, where health is determined by influences at multiple levels (e.g. public policy, community, institutional, interpersonal, and intrapersonal factors). Healthy Campus principles are rooted in collaborative endeavors, rather than a top-down approach.

This initiative aims to reach students at all levels and includes a myriad of campus partners and their commitment to move from individual-level health determinants and interventions to one where environmental factors and influences interact and, in turn, affect individual student behaviors.