Health and Wellbeing for People, Place, and Planet
In the fall of 2022, UMass Amherst became the 14th school in the nation to adopt the Okanagan Charter, an international call for post-secondary schools to:
- Embed health into all aspects of campus culture, across administration, operations, and academic mandates.
- Lead health promotion action and collaboration, locally and globally.
To achieve these goals, our commitment focuses on four pillars.
The Four Pillars of Wellbeing
Health and Wellness for Students, Faculty, and Staff
Bringing together programs, services, people, and units as part of an intentional, multidisciplinary, systems-level health promotion strategy designed to foster a culture of wellbeing.
Sustainability
Integrating campus sustainability initiatives encompassing academics and research; buildings and infrastructure; campus life and student activities; climate change and energy; food systems and permaculture; and waste and recycling.
Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
Identifying and highlighting the connections between justice, equity, and health in our community. Mobilizing the university’s long-standing commitment to social justice to inform inclusivity goals in classrooms, research labs, residence halls, workspaces, and beyond.
The Built & Natural Environment
While recognizing and respecting Indigenous Peoples as traditional stewards of this land, striving to create equitable healthy environments—including housing, open space, parks, and transportation—across the community.
In the news
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What does wellbeing mean to you?
On Founders Day, we interviewed staff, students, faculty, and community members to understand what wellbeing means to them.
Land Acknowledgement
The University of Massachusetts Amherst acknowledges that it was founded and built on the unceded homelands of the Pocumtuc Nation on the land of the Norrwutuck community.
We begin with gratitude for nearby waters and lands. We recognize these lands and waters as important Relations with which we are all interconnected and depend on to sustain life and wellbeing. The Pocumtuc had connections with these lands for millennia. Over 400 years of colonization, when Pocumtuc Peoples were displaced, many joined their Algonquian relatives to the east, south, west and north. That includes Mashpee and Aquinnah Wampanoag, Nipmuc, Narragansett, Mohegan, Pequot, Mohican, communities and Abenaki and other nations of the Wabanaki Confederacy. These Native peoples still maintain connections and relationships of care for these lands today. We also acknowledge that the University of Massachusetts Amherst is a Land Grant University. As part of the Morrill Land Grant Act, portions of land from 82 Native Nations west of the Mississippi were sold to provide the resources to found and build this university.
As an active first step toward decolonization, we encourage you to learn more about the Native Nations whose homelands UMass Amherst now resides on and the Indigenous homelands on which you live and work. We also invite you to deepen your relationship to these living lands and waters.