Overview
Laurentian’s new Certificate in Ecohealth Promotion prepares graduates to help people to make personal decisions and think systemically about improving both their health and that of the surrounding ecosystem. Following the successful completion of this 30-credit certificate, students will be able to:
- Integrate and apply curriculum, theory, and concepts related to health promotion, outdoor leadership, and environmental biology;
- Critically examine relevant conceptual and theoretical frameworks and models related to outdoor leadership, health promotion, ecosystem health, and ecohealth;
- Critically appraise the evidence-base for ecohealth and ecohealth promotion;
- Understand how a person’s ecohealth reflects harmonious and interactive physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, social, and ecological relationships;
- Compare and contrast ecohealth promotion with other diverse Indigenous land-based and outdoor therapeutic approaches to health promotion;
- Understand the diverse ways ecohealth can be negatively impacted through ecosystem degradation and disease transmission;
- Explore the various contraindications to consider when promoting or applying ecohealth principles;
- Investigate various ways to live holistically with the land in terms of harmonious and integrated human, animal, and plant health;
- Acquire wellness practices that reflect evidence-based ways to apply ecohealth promotion practices and techniques;
- Reflect on personal ecohealth in terms of physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, social, and ecological well-being;
- Assess how ecohealth and ecohealth promotion can benefit society and planet earth.
As a graduate, you will be equipped to enhance personal and planetary health by encouraging and training people, through harmonious interactions with nature, to aspire to a state of mutually beneficial relationships developed across interwoven dimensions of well-being (endohealth: physical, mental, emotional; and ectohealth: spiritual, social, and ecological).
Key Features
Investigate various ways to live holistically with the land in terms of harmonious and integrated human, animal, and plant health.
Acquire wellness practices that reflect evidence-based ways to apply ecohealth promotion practices and techniques.
Assess how ecohealth and ecohealth promotion can benefit society and planet earth.
Career Opportunities
Substantive interest in ecohealth and increased need for promotion are expected to grow for the foreseeable future. It is expected that graduates will use their ecohealth training in many diverse interdisciplinary fields including, but not limited to the following:
- Outdoor recreation/tourism
- Education
- Outdoor/nature therapy
- Wilderness/adventure therapy
- Forest therapy
- Health promotion
- Wellness consulting
- Public health
- Environmental stewardship/protection
Certificate Coordinator
Certificate Details
Program Language: English
Most courses can also be taken in French
Delivery method: In-person
Faculty: Faculty of Education and Health
School: School of Kinesiology and Health Sciences
Additional Facts and Information
What is Ecohealth?
Ecohealth is a conflation of an ecosystemic approach to health that uses systems theory to explore the intersection between human and environmental well-being. The health of people and the health of an ecosystem are inextricably interconnected with numerous directly and inversely linked causal pathways that can be both harmful and/or beneficial.
Promoting ecohealth is the process of helping people to make personal decisions and think systemically about improving both their wellness and that of the surrounding ecosystem. To enhance personal and planetary well-being, people should be supported and encouraged, through harmonious interactions with nature, to aspire to a state of mutually beneficial relationships made across interwoven dimensions of well-being. The graphic below depicts three internal dimensions (physical, mental, and emotional) and three external dimensions (spiritual, social, and ecological).
Evidence-based Wellness Practices
Increasing evidence has been accumulating for holistic health benefits associated with nature contact and participation in outdoor activities. Drawing on this evidence, wellness practices promote ecohealth, improve human health, and preserve the planet for future generations.
Examples of evidence-based wellness practices include:
- Participating in nature walks (gardens, parks, forests or water bodies)
- Being physically active outdoors, in nature
- Interacting or exercising with other people in nature
- Facilitating self-directed, unsupervised outdoor play for children
- Learning and teaching outdoors
- Earthing (directly connecting with the earth’s electrical charge)
- Praying, meditating and/or being mindful in nature
- Implementing pro-environmental behaviours
Laurentian University Campus Trails
Laurentian University comprises close to 700 acres of land that adjoin the vast Lake Laurentian Conservation Area. Enjoy the nature surrounding you and explore the many trails on and around our campus. It is a wellness practice to use these trails, with or without other people, by walking, hiking, jogging, observing, exploring, foraging, or simply accessing a sublime location to sit, meditate, pray, or be mindful.
This 30-credit program developed through the School of Kinesiology and Health Sciences is now available to students within the school. A limited number of new applicants and students from other programs at Laurentian will be accepted on a case-by-case basis.
There are no admission requirements for current students in the School of Kinesiology and Health Sciences.
Admission requirements for all non-School of Kinesiology and Health Sciences students are as follows:
- Either have completed a degree or diploma (i.e. new students applying to the university specifically for the certificate); or be completing a degree program at Laurentian University (i.e. current students registered in other programs)
- Complete the following courses either prior to or concurrently with the certificate courses (unless they the equivalent content was completed as part of previous degree or diploma program):
- BIOL 1700 Structure and Function of the Human Body OR
- BIOL 2105 Human Anatomy and Physiology or equivalent (6 credits)
- PHED 1006 Exercise Science or equivalent (3 credits)
- 6 credits of courses with a minimum of 50% Indigenous content (with the recommendation that these 6 credits include curriculum related to Indigenous health, health promotion, and/or land-based healing).
Contact the certificate coordinator regarding potential credit transferability.
If you are interested in completing the Ecohealth Promotion Certificate and would like to be contacted via e-mail with more information about the next steps, please complete the Pre-Registration Form.
Copy and paste the URL https://forms.gle/2QUV3wLibrYr32Hr5 into your preferred browser if the hyperlink does not work.
To view all of the required courses for this certificate, go to the Degree Options section of the Health Promotion program page and scroll down to Certificate in Ecohealth Promotion.