Best Practices Library and Guide
Introduction
What is the Best Practices Library and Guide?
To advance evidence-based post-secondary student mental health and wellness initiatives, the Best Practices Network developed the Best Practices Guide (herein referred to as the “Guide”) to identify and categorize practices that improve Canadian post-secondary students’ mental health and well-being. Practices within the Best Practices Continuum track are classified based on operationalized criteria, ranging from cutting-edge, emerging, promising, and best. Practices within the Indigenous-Specific track are classified based on the Aboriginal Ways Tried and True Framework.
BeST PRACTICES Library
The Best Practices Library is a repository of tools and information that assist campuses to learn, share, adopt, and disseminate evidence-informed and evidence-based practices that support student mental health.
Explore the Full Library
Find and share peer-reviewed, evidence-based mental health resources.
Latest Practices
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Pets Assisting with Student Success (PAWSS)
Developed by MacEwan University, Pets Assisting with Student Success (PAWSS) is a low-barrier accessible Animal Assisted Intervention (AAI) designed to…
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Thriving in Action
Developed by Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU), Thriving in Action (TiA) is an upstream, early alert program for equity-deserving students who…
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Roots of Resiliency
Developed by the University of Calgary, Roots of Resiliency is a seven-week program designed to foster resilience, support academic success,…
Submit a practice
Why Submit a Practice?
Beyond offering insights to the community, receiving a designation for your practice and being featured in the Best Practices Library allows you to:
Receive national recognition for your practice
Increase your practice’s credibility
Showcase your innovation and evaluation successes with other institutions.
Receive feedback and suggestions from expert reviewers to improve your practice
Collaborate with colleagues across the country who will adopt and evaluate your practice, providing an opportunity for the practice to progress along the continuum toward promising and best
Contribute towards establishing best practices to support post-secondary student mental health.
Submit a Practice
Help us create a network that supports, encourages, and reinforces a culture of evaluation to support evidence-based practices that support student mental health on campuses.
How and Why
Best Practices Guide Development
Why the Guide was developed
With increased recognition of the importance of evaluation practices, quality improvement, and program accountability within the post-secondary sector, the Guide seeks to support campuses by creating a process to identify practices that have had a positive impact on mental health outcomes for post-secondary students.
The Guide also utilizes a culturally appropriate tool that identifies successful practices in Indigenous contexts with the Ways Tried and True framework. Campuses share their evidence-based tools, program evaluation, and frameworks to support evaluation efforts.
How the Guide was developed
The Guide was developed by adopting and incorporating existing best practice frameworks and the Ways Tried and True framework in the health and mental health sectors based on an environmental scan.
To contextualize the Guide within the Canadian post-secondary mental health sector, the National Standard of Canada for Mental-Health and Well-Being for Post-Secondary Students was utilized.