As a global pandemic brought the world to a halt in 2020, doors opened for FISU and universities to bring health and wellbeing to university campuses globally. One year later since its launch, the FISU Healthy Campus programme already has more than 70 universities from 37 countries on the map that are on track to become FISU Healthy Campus certified with even more universities expected to take part as students and staff make their return to campus life this year.
Speaking about this first milestone, FISU Secretary General-CEO Eric Saintrond mentions the uniqueness of the programme and the direction the programme will take looking ahead.
“FISU does not only think about global events or structured sports within our membership, but also cares about improving physical and mental health, and sport practice is an essential dimension for student well-being on university campuses,” said Saintrond. “As per our constitution, FISU’s mission is to act for the health and well-being of all students – including students who do not participate in competitive sports.”
The programme was developed by studying best practices and benchmarking physical activity levels worldwide. This led to the creation of seven domains that are tailor made to encourage health and wellbeing for campus life:
- Physical activity and sport
- Nutrition
- Disease prevention
- Mental and social health
- Risk behaviour
- Environment, sustainability and social responsibility
- Healthy Campus management
The FISU Healthy Campus programme, embraced by universities globally, is a unique opportunity for universities to share their feedback and experiences with other universities of the programme so that they can make more effective decision with confidence. 
“The positive feedback we receive from the universities has been even higher than what we could have wished for, and this does reflect the great benefits of this programme – namely working towards the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in an organised manner and in a variety of different fields,” said Saintrond. “This has also developed better cohesion and coordination among all departments and services within universities as well.”
As the FISU Healthy Campus programme continues to grow, universities are embracing this initiative with open arms and continue to see benefits from university campus to the community at large—the overarching aim of the global University Sport Movement.
“The registered universities, as of today 72 of them, are very enthusiastic,” Saintrond explains, “However, more than 200 meetings have already been held with others that will join the programme. The expectation of growth is high, and universities always take some time to register after being aware of the programme, but we will soon see the impact of the work that has been done.”
Map of FISU Healthy Campus certified universitiesTo mark the one-year anniversary of the programme, FISU Healthy Campus will begin to publish the best practices of certified universities on the platform, so that others who decide on joining the programme can benefit from the knowledge and experience of a vast network of universities who have already accomplished important milestones in their development.
“Not only are we impressed with the number of universities who are committed to the programme,” said the Director of FISU Healthy Campus Fernando Parente, “but the quality of the work done by the universities is extremely impressive. The criteria necessary for certification have been very important for ensuring that universities are on track to achieving long term health and wellbeing on campus”
Among some of the first universities to sign up to the FISU Healthy Campus programme is the University of Turin, who acted as a pilot university for the project. The university’s active engagement with FISU is also reflected through its local university sports federation CUS Torino – along with Italy’s National University Sports Federation, CUSI – who are currently in the process of preparing for the winter 2025 FISU World University Games.
Given the early enrollment of the University of Turin into the Healthy Campus programme, universities who are part of the programme could soon see what best practices have been developed by this active establishment and how they have developed and improved their campus lifestyle.
For more information about the programme, registration and best practices, please visit the FISU Healthy Campus page. For more on how to get your university involved, please contact healthy.campus@fisu.net.