The international higher education sector has developed growing interest in the concept of ‘sense of belonging’ for students over recent years. Understanding sense of belonging is about understanding how students come to feel connected with their peers, their place of study and their university community. This paper engages with the conversations happening across the United Kingdom, United States and Europe, about what sense of belonging is, how it can be fostered to improve students’ academic outcomes and experiences within their educational communities, and the key role of evaluation in making change for students. 

Through insights from a literature review of international research and from primary research conducted in an English higher education institution, the paper aims to connect the worlds of research and evaluation to further knowledge of both sense of belonging research and a Theory of Change evaluation framework. The use of a case study will demonstrate how research-engaged evaluation methodologies can be used to assess the real-world application of research findings and their potential impact on students. Alongside the UK context of the case study, research and real-world findings from other contexts will be integrated e.g., student-led bonding and belonging activities in universities based in Denmark, Sweden, and Norway.  

The research questions driving this work, and framing the structure of this proposed presentation, are: 

• What is ‘sense of belonging’ in the higher education context and why does it matter? 

• How can researchers and evaluators contribute to developing a sense of belonging and community for diverse student groups in universities across different geographical contexts? 

• How can researchers and evaluators work together to improve outcomes for students in real-world applications of research?  

These research questions align with the key purpose of this presentation: to articulate how research and evaluation can collaborate to establish, and ideally to improve, the impact on outcomes when planning and delivering interventions intended to facilitate a greater sense of belonging and community for students. The paper also investigates how university colleagues (including researchers, evaluators, and practitioners) can use existing research findings to inform how they facilitate diverse and inclusive communities and spaces for students. This objective will be met by sharing insights from key research on sense of belonging, including defining how ‘fit’ is influential for students’ belonging academically, socially and in the spaces which combine the academic and social.  

These concepts of ‘fit’ come from the conceptual and theoretical frameworks underpinning the paper, which have been developed and challenged by the growing pool of literature on these topics. The conceptual frameworks for ‘sense of belonging’ span psychosocial, sociological, and educational theories; as my understandings have been influenced by multiple authors and ways of thinking, there is opportunity to share multiple theoretical perspectives within the paper. Crucially, I draw on the work of Lewis and Hodges (2014) who consider the two dimensions of “social fit” and “ability or academic fit” as the foundations of sense of belonging; this distinction acts as stimulus for the case study of encouraging greater student engagement in academic school-related societies.  

Alongside the conceptual frameworks relating to sense of belonging and community, this paper is also informed by, and engaged with, the evaluative framework of Theory of Change. This approach is often used to evaluate community-based change interventions, aiming to make visible the complex interactions between actions and their outcomes. The paper will share insights on how a Theory of Change works and how it can be practically used in response to, and alongside, research and evidence in real-life application - in this case, in interventions aimed to facilitate university students’ sense of belonging to their academic school (/academic department).

The paper is informed by multiple methodologies from the worlds of research and evaluation. Firstly, the insights from sense of belonging research have been collected through a literature review undertaken to establish a comprehensive account of existing research related to the topic. The literature review used a methodical search strategy, primarily drawing on electronic databases accessible via my institution. The search strategy excluded texts which did not have a clear research focus on sense of belonging, and snowball sampling was used after the initial search to strengthen the breadth of the search. The literature review focused on a sample of 14 relevant texts, as the review had been commissioned to function as a starting point for developing an institutional understanding of sense of belonging in the higher education context. Key sources cited in the literature review include Thomas’ What works? report (2012), belonging intervention research from Walton and Cohen (2011) and the more recent work of Weiss (2021). Through the literature review, synthesis of differing perspectives on the concept of sense of belonging was possible, allowing me to analyse and suggest definitions and terminology which incorporated multiple sources. Opportunities for me to conduct further research in this area are under discussion, with goals to expand the literature review in future and consolidate learning from grey literature and more recent article releases. Secondly, the paper aims to socialise with delegates the methodology of a Theory of Change (ToC) evaluation framework, through a case study research-evaluation process using this methodology. The paper discusses the process of using the literature review research insights to inform the delivery and evaluation of an academic societies funding and events scheme. This evaluation used Connell and Kubisch’s four-stage Theory of Change evaluation framework (1998), which will be elaborated on within the paper using the real-world example of the academic societies funding scheme evaluation. This framework includes the development of a programme-specific ToC, using this to focus the evaluation research questions and data collection methods, evidence-gathering to understand context, inputs, activities, outputs, outcomes and impact, and analysis of the findings to establish whether the intended outcomes outlined in the ToC have been met. The application of this framework will be demonstrated through discussion of the ToC created and iteratively developed during the case study evaluation process.

There are significant findings I wish to share in this paper, as well as some expected outcomes which are still in progress, as the evaluation case study is scheduled to complete in February. Findings from the literature review include the key distinctions made by Lewis and Hodges about social fit and academic fit, which I have further synthesised with other findings to create working definitions of what encompasses each ‘fit.’ These definitions are used to inform the conclusion that social fit and academic fit should become used more commonly in education research across various contexts when we discuss sense of belonging in higher education. Other findings from the literature review include correlations between sense of belonging and improved academic outcomes, which will frame the significance of the topic. The ongoing evaluation case study will offer a range of findings specific to the English higher education context, exploring key themes of the impact of the academic societies funding scheme on students’ sense of belonging to their academic school, engagement with their academic school, and students’ own definitions of what sense of belonging means to them. As the evaluation results are complemented by international research, it is hoped that the outcomes of this evaluation can be useful for colleagues across different regions and the ToC approach can be personalised to each individual context and initiative. Early findings from the evaluation do suggest that there has been an increase in students’ sense of belonging associated with the academic schools funding scheme. The paper will end with reflections on the research-evaluation process overall, sharing conclusions to answer the research questions and establish how this model of evaluating research-engaged practice could be drawn on in other contexts and geographies to foster students’ sense of belonging across the globe.

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