Jacqueline Wong
Students’ sense of belonging in college can have an impact on their college experiences and motivation to learn. Some students find it easy to fit into the school environment and maintain good interpersonal relationship with peers while other students feel out of place in school and have troubles handling interpersonal relationship with peers. This feeling of disconnectedness with school can have a negative impact on student success.
Won, Wolters, and Mueller (2017) examined the relations between college students’ sense of belonging and self-regulated learning. Based on the survey results, three main findings emerged. First, college students’ sense of belonging is not a unitary concept but consists of two aspects: sense of belonging to school and sense of belonging to peer groups. Second, there are positive correlations between sense of belonging and self-regulated learning strategies. Students who reported greater sense of belonging to school also reported greater use of metacognitive strategies and academic time management. On the other hand, students who reported greater sense of belonging to peer groups also reported greater use of study groups and peer-based learning strategies. Third, student achievement goals mediates the relationship between sense of belonging and self-regulated learning strategies. Students who had greater sense of belonging to school gravitated towards mastery goals. Therefore, weakening the positive relationship between sense of belonging to school and self-regulated learning strategies. Students who had greater sense of belonging to peers gravitated towards performance goals.
In conclusion, the authors raised the importance of creating a learning environment that helps students to develop a stronger sense of belonging to school. Students will achieve greater success when they feel connected, accepted and respected in school.