Impact case study database

International Level: Global Priorities and Expert Guidance

“UCLan’s research has…helped shape the influential Okanagan Charter…[and] had significant impact at institutional, national and international levels – with the theoretical and empirical insights having far-reaching influence on health promotion policy and practice across the globe, benefitting the wellbeing of students, staff and wider campus communities” [A].

Dooris was opening keynote speaker at the influential 2015 International Health Promoting Universities and Colleges Conference, with 375 participants from 33 countries spanning practice, policy and research. Insights from his research led to requests to distil findings into practitioner resources for use in other countries. For example, ‘The Eight Ps of Health Promoting Universities’ from an early research paper [1], for Healthy Minds, Healthy Campuses in Canada. A key conference outcome was the Okanagan International Charter for Health Promoting Universities and Colleges [A]. Strongly shaped by our research [1, 2], this offered a framework to guide and mobilise action and research; and issued calls for universities to embed health in campus culture and provide local and global health promotion leadership. To maximise the Charter’s impact, an International Health Promoting Universities and Colleges Network was set up in 2016 to support global adoption and implementation. This produced a policy- and practice-focused website profiling our research [1,4]. This has representation from 12 national/cross-country networks, including, Asia, Canada, Germany, Ibero-America, New Zealand and the UK [B]. Spanning more than 35 countries in five continents, these represent over 400 universities adopting the Healthy Universities approach. This shifted institutions from ad-hoc interventions to a strategic systemic approach. This means that responses to student- and staff-related health challenges, such as mental ill-health, no longer rely on free-standing campaigns or projects, but co-ordinate these with enhanced service provision. This includes curricular reconfiguration and health-promoting campus design, thus embedding evidence-informed programmes across the whole institution. Additionally, Dooris has been called on to share practice insights from our research [1-6] with emerging initiatives and networks (e.g. India, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Turkey). In terms of significance and reach, the impact of this is evidenced in the USA: “As Director of Health Promotion Strategy at the University of Southern California…I have been inspired by and drawn on Mark’s research...[He] has a global reputation and is seen as an international thought leader in…Healthy Settings and Health Promoting Universities. The conceptual and empirical research conducted by his team leads international thinking in these areas…[and] he has played a key role in facilitating theoretical constructs and research findings to be translated into practical actions with real-world impact…I have been able to share this learning and begin to influence practice across the USA…Since his monumental contribution to the creation and initial adoption of The Okanagan Charter, Dr. Dooris’ work is spoken of in every conversation here in the States as pivotal to the future of Higher Education” [C]. In a recent global study examining leadership for a whole university approach [5], Dooris and Farrier (collaborating with Sue Powell, MMU) illustrated the impact of their research by generating institutional case studies. Implementation at the University of Sydney (70,000 students, 7,500 staff), informed by our research, has used the Self-Review Tool [4] to facilitate identification of priority areas for action. It has also built on work initiated by ‘champions’ to secure senior leaders’ commitment to Healthy Universities and align this with changing cultures and environments to advance student and staff wellbeing and performance. New activity with wide-ranging buy-in includes an online course for undergraduate students to learn about nutrition, physical activity, sleep, alcohol and drugs and mental wellbeing. The University of British Colombia (65,000 students, 16,000 staff), has pioneered Canadian action for Healthy Universities [A], a model informed by our research, demonstrating a whole organisation approach through a distributed leadership model. It has prioritised ‘health in all policies’, embedding the Okanagan Charter in its Frameworks for a Physically Active and Nutritionally Sound Campus, Green Building Plan and Mental Health and Resilience Framework. It is now drawing on the Okanagan Charter and Dooris’s wider research [1-6] to guide evidence-informed practice for student, staff and community health: “The…research carried out by Mark and colleagues has pioneered an understanding and proposed early models of what a whole university approach can look like in the context of health promotion, helping to validate and inform approaches taken at…the University of British Columbia and across the Canadian Network” [A]. Dooris’ research has also been implemented in the 2020 National Student Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Framework for Ireland [D]. The reach of our research is also evidenced by Dooris delivering numerous invited keynotes at major policy and practice events, attracting thousands of high-level decision-makers concerned with real-life application of learning. For example: the 2019 IX Ibero-American Health Promoting Universities Congress (Mexico), the 2019 2nd ASEAN Universities Network Health Promotion Conference (Philippines) and the 2018 NASPA Well-Being and Health Promotion Leadership Conference (Portland, Oregon), attended by 1,300 people: “Appreciating his trailblazing research…I proposed Mark as an opening panel member and keynote speaker…This ensured that a broad spectrum of professionals engaged mainly in service delivery and practice within universities and colleges across North America and beyond were able to benefit from the learning and insights that his research has generated” [C].

National Level: Strategic Guidance and Expert Advice

The research [1-6] has made significant contributions to national strategy and guidance. As well as informing the Royal Society for Public Health’s Tackling Health Inequalities report, which highlighted the potential for healthy settings (including universities) approaches to improve health outcomes, Dooris’s research has influenced the widespread advocacy for and the adoption of whole university and whole system approaches to mental health. Universities UK’s 2015 Student Mental Wellbeing in Higher Education, widely used by HEIs to guide policy and practice, references Dooris [1] : “The last decade has seen increased interest in a holistic ‘healthy settings’ approach… Pioneering work undertaken at the University of Central Lancashire (Dooris 2001) has stimulated developments and initiatives in other institutions across the sector” [E]. Health Education England’s 2019 NHS Staff and Learners Mental Health Commission profiles our research [4, 5] and the contribution of Healthy Universities, noting: “it is important that the development and provision of services takes place within a broader commitment to developing as a healthy and health enhancing organisation” [F].

Student Minds’ 2019 University Mental Health Charter references Dooris’s research [3] and acknowledges the role of the Healthy Universities model in calling “for the sector to adopt a whole-university approach to mental health” [G]. Dooris has also contributed to the British Property Federation’s 2019 Student Wellbeing and Private Sector Student Accommodation guidance, which advocates a systemic approach. Dooris is an invited member of Universities UK’s Mental Health in Higher Education Advisory Group, which oversaw the formulation of the 2017 Stepchange Framework. Subsequently refreshed as Stepchange: Mentally Healthy Universities, this endorsed the approach and framework informed by Dooris and colleagues’ research, noting that: “The development of a whole university approach to mental health is informed by…the Okanagan Charter for Health Promoting Universities and Colleges and the Healthy Universities framework” [H]. Universities UK note that Dooris’s research has achieved significant impact through providing: “an important conceptual frame for the StepChange approach’ and informing ‘the establishment and support of a significant community of practice across the UK sector to support implementation” [I]. Supported by ministers and sector bodies, Stepchange was piloted by three HEIs (UWE, Cardiff, York) and adopted by many others as the basis for their own strategies [I]. It has also had significant international impact generating enquiries from Australia (where it is informing a strategic framework), New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, Norway, Ireland and the Netherlands [I]. Additionally, Dooris’s research has directly informed the whole-of-university Australian Framework for Promoting Student Wellbeing in Universities, which focuses on environments, services, awareness, knowledge and curricula. Most recently, in the context of COVID-19, Dooris and colleagues’ research [5] is explicitly used to frame the wellbeing section of Advance-HE’s Capstone Report for its Creating Socially Distanced Campuses and Education Project [J]. Dooris has also drawn on his research to deliver expert guidance across UK administrations. He has, with Sue Powell (MMU), organised three high-level UK Healthy Universities Policy Summits in 2018/19, which profiled the University of Central Lancashire’s research [1-6] with invited representation from Universities UK, NUS, Advance HE, public health agencies for England, Wales, Scotland and N. Ireland, Office for Students and funding councils for Wales and Scotland. These resulted in excellent feedback and commitments to strengthen collaboration within N. Ireland, Wales and Scotland, and initiate work across funding councils [K]. Dooris was an expert member of the Welsh Government taskforce developing the Healthy and Sustainable Higher/Further Education Framework [K]. Drawing extensively on our research [1-4] and specifically the Self-Review Tool [4], this calls on Welsh universities and colleges to develop and implement ‘whole university’ approaches to health, wellbeing and sustainability. This maps priority health issues against key organisational aspects. His research has also strongly informed the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales Well-being and Health in Higher Education Policy Statement [K]. He was invited by the Public Health Agency for N. Ireland to address an inaugural Student Wellbeing Networking Event and meet with Queen’s and Ulster Universities to discuss adoption and practical implementation of the Healthy Universities model. This work focused on connecting student, staff and campus wellbeing agendas through integrated service provision, cultural change and healthy campus design: “The research carried out by Mark and colleagues has been instrumental in spearheading Healthy Universities activity within Northern Ireland, helping to develop an understanding of and commitment to whole system approaches to health and wellbeing within the higher education sector…[and] in informing policy and investment within the public health system in Northern Ireland in the support of the wellbeing of our student population” [L].

Institutional and Population Level: Adoption of the Healthy Universities Model

The research has had far-reaching influence on institutional practice, impacting on population health and wellbeing through adoption of the Healthy Universities approach set out in the Okanagan Charter by 86 UK HEIs. Case studies from recent research illustrate this [5]. At the

University of Central Lancashire (23,000 students, 3,400 staff) Dooris has championed Healthy Universities for 25 years, its initiative constantly being informed by underpinning research [1-6]. Informed by use of the Self-Review Tool [4], it is widely regarded as a beacon of good practice for its joined-up whole institution approach. Its action plan spans priority areas such as food, mental health and physical environments and contributes to key corporate commitments, such as: teaching and learning, changing the culture and civic engagement, thereby enhancing student, staff and community health. It has developed a holistic approach to mental health across the university and produced guidance to ensure that capital projects maximise their positive impact on health and sustainability, for example, through natural light and nature-connectedness. The University of the West of England (30,000 students, 3,000 staff) has championed a whole system perspective informed by our research, embedding health in all policies and processes and breaking down siloed working. It has secured executive-level leadership, aligned its health and sustainability commitments, and engaged stakeholders across faculties, services, the Students’ Union and external bodies to develop whole university approaches to issues such as alcohol, drugs, sexual health and mental health. It has used the Self-Review Tool to catalyse cross-silo communication and facilitate reflective self-assessment to enhance positive health impacts for students, staff and the wider community [4]. It has piloted Stepchange through its Mental Wealth initiative. The UK Healthy Universities Network, convened and co-chaired by Dooris, is continually informed by the above research [1-6] and plays a key role in supporting a growing number of HEIs (86 UK; 27 non-UK – up from 47 UK in 2008) to apply the Healthy Universities approach. As of 30th November, there has been 55,409 unique visitors from 186 countries to the Healthy Universities website.