Belonging in Education: Lessons from the Belonging Project

Abstract

This paper presents some preliminary findings from The Belonging Project—a longitudinal learning and teaching research project seeking to develop and define a new approach to student engagement. In this project, the concept of belonging is used as a tactic to engage both staff and students in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University as part of the project’s aim to improve the student experience. This paper maps the way in which we use belonging—defined in relation to the educational experience—as a point of departure to achieve this outcome. Having established our definition of belonging and its purpose in our project, we then discuss some key results of focus groups with students, outlining the way in which students navigate issues of transition, interdisciplinarity, and notions of space and place, in their relationship to university and campus life. 

Keywords

• student engagement, transition, sense of belonging