Understanding How Students' Sense of Belonging Develops During Undergraduate Field Experiences: Supports, Barriers, and Implications for Faculty

This project aims to serve the national interest by addressing a critical need in the scholarship of STEM teaching and learning. Specifically, it is designed to advance understanding about how students' sense of belonging develops in undergraduate learning experiences outside of the traditional classroom. The project will focus on residential undergraduate field courses, a pivotal learning experience in STEM disciplines such as ecology, geology, and geography.

A sense of belonging plays an important role in students' mental health and well-being, academic achievement and motivation, and institution-level retention. It is also pivotal for the persistence of students from communities that are underrepresented in STEM disciplines. The overarching goal of the project is to build the capacity of geosciences and biology faculty to support the development of students' sense of belonging.

In this way, it can help to improve the inclusivity of courses that are a critical pathway for thousands of undergraduate students in field-based STEM disciplines.

This project has the potential for broad reach and impact on student engagement and learning in multiple STEM disciplines and is likely to have a positive impact on the inclusivity of undergraduate field education. It may be especially important for students from communities that have been historically excluded from field-based STEM disciplines, whose persistence is strongly linked to sense of belonging in the scientific community.

The project focuses on advancing understanding about how students' sense of belonging develops in residential field experiences and builds capacity for faculty from geosciences and biology to support the growth of students' sense of belonging. The following objectives will guide the project study: 1) Identify factors that contribute to and hinder the development of students' sense of belonging during residential geosciences and biology undergraduate field courses; 2) Characterize the design and implementation of geosciences and biology undergraduate field courses, specifically what practices faculty are using and what challenges and needs exist for the development of students' sense of belonging during undergraduate field courses; 3) Create an empirically-based framework of how students' sense of belonging develops during residential undergraduate field courses; 4) Facilitate a Community of Practice that uses and contributes to promising practices for the design and assessment of inclusive field courses that support the development of students' sense of belonging; and 5) Articulate a suite of promising practices that have the potential to promote the development of students' sense of belonging during a range of formats of undergraduate field courses and for students from different backgrounds.

Using innovative and robust mixed methods research approaches, this work will contribute to the wider body of evidence-based, student-centered practices in undergraduate STEM education. The work has the potential to provide a deep and impactful contribution to the fields of discipline-based education research (particularly in geosciences and biology), higher education, education and social psychology, and diversity, equity, and inclusion.

The NSF IUSE: EHR Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through the Engaged Student Learning track, the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.