Wellness and active living

Aerobics classes at the Works

An important priority for the Department of Human Resources over the coming months will be to facilitate the development of an integrated, strategic approach to the area of employee wellness and active living. Encouraging and supporting a strong focus on employee health in the workplace offers significant potential benefits for both employees and the university, and the university’s senior administration have indicated their strong desire to examine how we might more effectively do this on a long-term basis.

The members of the Working Group on Wellness and Active Living are as follows: Gerard McDonald - Director, Human Resources Pam Murphy - Human Resources Barry Hanlon - Marine Institute Carl Horwood - Facilities Management Carol Sullivan - Library Deborah Canning - Engineering Dennis Waterman - Sir Wilfred Grenfell College Elizabeth Church - Counselling Centre Jean Snook - German and Russian John Royle - Retiree Kevin O’Leary - Continuing Education Mary Jane Puxley - Office of the Registrar Michael Murray - Faculty of Medicine Robert Shea - Career Development and Experiental Learning

The department favors an open process of internal consultation which will give all interested parties an opportunity to provide input and to suggest ideas. Particularly in an institution such as Memorial, everyone stands to benefit greatly from the diversity of views and expertise which we have available to us. The department has just completed the process of establishing an ad hoc working group on wellness and active living. This group is comprised of a representative cross-section of the university community, including representatives from all three unions, our non-bargaining group, and the pensioners’ association.

This working group will have a general mandate of assisting the department with the development of a policy and long-term approach to the promotion of employee wellness and active living. As Gerard McDonald, director of Human Resources, stated in his Newsline message in early May, it is hoped that this group will take a creative approach to examining the practices of others and identifying the various ideas and opportunities which may be available to the university in this area.

Human Resources will be creating a space on its Web site devoted to wellness and active living. This site should be ready this summer and its availability will be announced through Newsline at the appropriate time. This site will be used to post items of interest related to wellness, as well as updates related to the activities and progress of the working group.

Wellness activities
The Department of Human Resources sponsored three short-term wellness activities during National Fitness Month in May:
a smoking cessation program; free drop-ins at The Works; and health fair at the main dining hall. Considering the short notice and the time of year, these programs yielded very worthwhile results. Six employees participated in the smoking cessation program provided by the Newfoundland Lung Association. There were approximately 270 drop-ins at The Works, and an unknown number of other people took advantage of the weather to walk or run outside. Approximately 250 employees visited the Health Fair, and the vast majority of them availed of the blood pressure, BMI and/or blood sugar testing which was done on site.

Several employees have already provided feedback on these initiatives, and the department would be very interested in receiving any further input which employees may wish to give. Employees should feel free to forward their comments or suggestions to the attention of Pam Murphy or via e-mail to humanres@mun.ca.