Okanagan Making a Brighter World

The Okanagan Charter is an International Charter for Health Promoting Universities & Colleges. The purpose of the Okanagan Charter is to provide guidance and inspiration by providing a framework to promote the importance of health and well-being on higher education institutions.

This website is a resource for all McMaster students, faculty, staff and the community to help locate existing resources, programs, research and educational opportunities in health and well-being.

Why are we called McMaster Okanagan?

We are called McMaster Okanagan based off The Okanagan Charter. The Okanagan Charter is the outcome of the 2015 International Conference on Health Promoting Universities and Colleges held in Kelowna, British Columbia. The Charter was developed in collaboration with researchers, practitioners, administrators, students and policy makers from 45 countries representing both educational and health organizations. The Charter inspires universities to take action in embedding well-being into their everyday operations, business practices and academic mandates.

Following McMaster’s signing of the Charter, the McMaster Okanagan Working Group was struck and tasked with providing leadership, coordination and oversight of initiatives related to the Calls to Action and McMaster’s commitments to the Charter. The goal was to create an appropriate institutional “home” for the initiative. The committee, chaired by Dr. Paul O’Byrne, met for the first time in March 2018. The Committee continued to evolve, and in September 2019, the Committee was renamed the McMaster Okanagan Committee (MOC) and official Terms of Reference were adopted.

To learn more about McMaster Okanagan and what we do, click here.