Based out of the University of Alberta, the Students’ Invested in Health Association (SIHA) is a health promotion and community development organization situated in the non-governmental sector of the field of public health. SIHA’s mission is to transform primary health care philosophy into action by creating sustainable projects both locally within Edmonton and other Alberta regions and internationally in Tanzania, East Africa.

 

SIHA’s values are based on the ideals of universal health care, including the principles of sustainable, community-based programming and the interdisciplinary nature of primary health. As such, SIHA creates and implements projects according to community-directed collaboration, sustainable programming involving local partnership, and multi-sectoral action. By extension, SIHA has chosen to focus its efforts primarily at engaging in meaningful partnerships, fostering reciprocal education and co-learning about the social, economic, and cultural components of primary health care, while fostering skills that are essential to health care organization and community outreach.

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History 

 

SIHA was established as a student run, non-profit organization out of the University of Alberta in 1989. Since its inception, SIHA’s projects have been based on the “Health for All”  slogan promoted by the 1978 International Conference on Primary Health Care in Alma-Ata.

 

For 26 years, SIHA has provided an exceptional opportunity to post-secondary students to gain both a theoretical grounding and a substantive field experience in global and community health, project development, community education, NGO management, and governance.

 

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