Introduction
In October 2020, the Mental Health Commission of Canada (MHCC) and the Canadian Standard Association (CSA) Group released the National Standard of Canada for Mental Health and Well-being for Post-Secondary Students (the Standard). The Standard provides Canadian post-secondary institutions with a set of voluntary, flexible guidelines that help support the mental health and wellbeing of their students. You can download a copy of the Standard here.
In 2021, the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation (SRDC) and the Centre for Innovation in Campus Mental Health (CICMH) supported a consortium of Greater Toronto Area (GTA) colleges in exploring options on how to feasibly navigate and implement the Standard within their campus communities.
As a result of this work, CICMH has pulled together a toolkit to provide you and your post-secondary institution with information to build an understanding of the different components of the Standard to support both your thinking about and implementation of the Standard within your campus community. To that end, we have included the following in this toolkit:
Environmental Scan
Purpose: Supports your understanding of the national landscape.
The scan highlights the results of an environmental scan of exemplary practices at Canadian post-secondary institutions that align with the strategic pillars of the Standard, which are:
- Supportive, Safe, and Inclusive Post-Secondary Environment
- Literacy, Education, and Stigma Reduction
- Accessibility
- Early Intervention
- Mental Health Supports
- Crisis Management and Postvention
A printable highlight of the strategic pillars of the Standard can be found here.
Rubric
Purpose: Provides your institution with a straightforward way to gauge alignment with the Standard.
The rubric was designed to create a starting point for post-secondary institutions, to be used as a high-level self-assessment in measuring the degree to which their existing practices, programs, and policies align with the Standard.
Campus Mental Health Action Tracker
Purpose: To support post-secondary institutions with aligning implementation of campus mental health efforts with the Standard.
The Campus Mental Health Action Tracker was designed as a tool to guide and support post-secondary institutions who are working to align their programs, policies, and practices with the Standard.
Mental Health Policy Inventory
Purpose: Illustrates how the Standard can inform internal policy.
The policy inventory reflects on how policies fall within the Standard and provides examples of reflection questions pertaining to policies within your own post-secondary institution.
Key Takeaways from the Project with the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation (SRDC) and the Centre for Innovation in Campus Mental Health (CICMH)
Purpose: Provides insight into implementing the Standard.
This section of the toolkit provides a background on how pieces of the toolkit came together. As you will see, SRDC and CICMH collaborated to identify and elaborate on different ‘entry points’ institutional stakeholders can take into the Standard and its implementation. This section provides a concise overview of the work, the collaboration, and the project outcomes.
Infosheet
Purpose: Highlights relevant resources.
The infosheet provides nationally available resources that can support the implementation of the Standard on Canadian post-secondary campuses.