How can we encourage healthier relationships with alcohol and cannabis among Hamilton post-secondary students?
Project Description: The City’s Public Health Section is working to promote safer choices about alcohol and cannabis use among post-secondary students through a targeted evidence-based harm reduction health promotion campaign. In 2025, a Semester in Residence student team sourced an existing poster campaign and gathered feedback from students on what they liked, disliked, and how it could be improved. A Winter 2026 CityLAB project included developing the posters based on the feedback in the previous term.
This semester, the CityLAB project team shall implement and evaluate the campaign aiming to promote healthier approaches to safer legal substance use. This could include refining the existing campaign materials to better resonate with students, potentially developing a website for the campaign, supporting implementation of the campaign across post-secondary settings, and evaluating its effectiveness.
Why the focus on alcohol and cannabis?
Alcohol and cannabis, while legal and widely available in Ontario, are not risk-free substances. Heavy use of either can lead to short- and long-term harms, compounded when used together. Use during adolescence and early adulthood carries additional risks as brain development is incomplete.
Why the focus on post-secondary students?
Youth aged 19-24 often consume alcohol and cannabis at higher rates than other age groups due to biological, social, and environmental factors. Health behaviours adopted during this period often persist into adulthood, making this an opportune time to promote safer choices.
The summary of potential project tasks include:
Review existing campaign materials and student feedback from previous work;
Refine campaign messaging and design to improve relevance and impact;
Explore website development to support the campaign;
Support planning and implementation of the campaign;
Engage with students to gather feedback during rollout;
Evaluate campaign reach and effectiveness; and
Provide recommendations for future improvements and broader rollout
The project results shall help inform next steps and potential broader implementation of the harm reduction health promotion campaign.
City Staff: Rick Epp, Healthy and Safe Communities Department
Deliverables: Marketing report, marketing campaign, developing a website, pilot
Project Start Date/ Availability: Fall 2026
Location: City Wide
City Strategy Priority: Healthy and Safe Communities