This mixed methodological study examines the relationship between participation in a residential commons system and sense of belonging in the context of an elite, highly residential liberal arts institution. Students of color, students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, and students who do not participate in Greek letter organizations reported…

This study explored what motivated undergraduates to serve as peer mentors in a leadership-themed living-learning community. Using McClelland's Acquired Needs Theory (1961) as the theoretical framework, we conducted a deductive content analysis to describe peer mentors' motivation to lead. We found evidence of all three of McClelland's identified…

This qualitative research study examines the sense of belonging among first year students during the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, the study focuses on how the COVID-19 pandemic has influenced a sense of belonging among first year students as they transition to college. Focus group data collected at a small, liberal arts institution was…

Commuter students face a number of challenges, yet how they influence the experience of those who join sororities and fraternities is unknown. The purpose of this study is to explore those challenges, the strategies participants used to overcome them, and how policies and practices influenced their experience through interviews with eight alumni…

Students from marginalized religious backgrounds face myriad challenges on college and university campuses, and negative effects are especially pronounced for Muslim students. Wearing hijab can put college students at a greater risk of marginalization amidst a climate of Islamophobia. Although there is a growing body of research on Muslim college…

The purpose of this quantitative multi-institutional study was to examine the contributions of institutional integration and cultural integrity to Native college students' sense of belonging within Non-Native Colleges and Universities. Both cultural integrity and institutional integration contributed significantly to sense of belonging. This study…

The purpose of this article is to show how scholars and practitioners can come together to address opportunity gaps for Black students at Michigan State University. The authors detail identity-conscious student success strategies within Reason and Kimball's model of theory to practice used by a group of Black faculty and staff. Among the specific…

This descriptive qualitative study provides a greater understanding about the approaches, challenges, and strategies associated with developing and sustaining affinity programs for Black collegiate women in higher education. Using a conceptual framework based on the theories of program planning and intersectionality, this paper offers in-depth…

Student veterans are not monolithic, but many have shared experiences. As higher education considers ways to serve this growing population, it is important to recognize the rich data that comes from location-specific, branch-specific, and program-specific qualitative studies, in addition to patterns that emerge across geographical and…

Based on Boyer's (1990) principles of community, the purpose of this study was to examine how students' perceived sense of campus community contributed to explaining their satisfaction with school life. Participants were randomly selected from a student email address list obtained by the Office of Assessment at a mid-size university in the Midwest…

Research on both autistic and LGBTQ college students has uncovered themes of marginalization, selective disclosure, and efforts to build community and resist oppression. However, little work has focused on autistic LGBTQ college students and how they understand and manage their multiple identities. To address this gap, we used narrative inquiry to…

Sense of belonging contributes to academic success, persistence, and self-efficacy among students, and is especially poignant for first-generation students who are less likely to engage socially, intellectually, and academically. Residential spaces provide the ideal environment to examine belongingness among first-generation students because of…