Health & Wellness Initiatives


wellness-center-rendering.jpg"The health and safety of students are top priorities for the university — and for us — and we hope that our gift can help make the Wellness Center one of the best facilities in the nation. We fully support plans to house all important aspects of health promotion and treatment under one roof and our investments in this area show our commitment to helping make this a reality."

Bee McLeod ’83, MBA ’91 and Goody Tyler HON ’11

A Letter from the Interim Associate Vice President for Health & Wellness

William & Mary – the most resilient and flourishing campus in the nation! Has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?

In recent years, we have been intentionally shifting the paradigm of how our campus thinks about wellness. When we assess the wellbeing of W&M, we find a lot to admire and to inspire us. We also find some concerns. Concerns that reflect a national trend among young adults that is amplified in communities like ours. W&M is fortunate to attract and retain students who are deeply caring and who are serious about what's important to them. They come from communities where they have received distinction for their intelligence and talent and enter a campus a community where everyone is smart and gifted. They are also transitioning to an adult world of uncertainty, relentless pace, and decreased margin for error. This creates a perfect storm of comparative thinking, with unhealthy patterns of perfectionism and escapism as the norm.

We’re challenging that paradigm. We are taking the concepts and research around flourishing and integrative wellness to create a new normal. We are committed to creating a culture where wellness is recognized as the foundation of excellence — a culture where one leads with values and trust, instead of fear and control. We want students to learn what wellness looks like for them, and to become active, mature consumers of health and wellness resources. We are moving away from an illness-based model of wellness and embracing one of integrative wellness that is holistic, multidimensional, and self-directed.

The new McLeod Tyler Wellness Center will reflect that model of integrative wellness. It will be the new home for Student Health, Counseling, Health Promotion, the wellness activities of Campus Recreation and the Center for Mindfulness and Authentic Excellence (CMAX). Students will not only see it as place to go for counseling or a medical exam, but they will be able to engage in yoga, massage, mindfulness meditation, Tai Chi, acupuncture, biofeedback, resilience training and more.

Positioning the McLeod Tyler Wellness Center in the heart of campus was no accident. Our biggest cultural shift is for students to see wellness as the heart and soul of our shared life here. They bring big hearts to our campus. Their stress is a function of those big hearts. We want them to continue caring and to manage the stress of caring in a healthy manner. Developing that level of flourishing is a community responsibility. We need your encouragement, your curiosity, your wisdom, your challenge, and your support. I invite you to be a part of this exciting commitment to develop a community of lion-hearted, eagle-eyed, resilient, young adults who will change the world with purpose, authenticity and compassion.

Linda Knight
Interim Associate VP for Health & Wellness

Giving Opportunities 

Health & Wellness Initiatives Links

  •  Suzanne M. Armstrong ’93, Assistant Vice President of Development, Campus Initiatives
  •  757-221-7647
  •   smarmstrong@wm.edu