This article delves into the pivotal role of Christian Athlete Circles as a new religious counter-space designed to foster inclusive spiritual growth for student-athletes, contrasting this organization with existing athlete ministries. Drawing from scholarly literature and informed by autoethnographic methods, the article highlights the necessity…

The first year of university can be a vulnerable time, especially for students who describe themselves as shy and who may be reluctant to engage socially. Shyness, which can be closely aligned with social anxiety, often reduces opportunities for students to belong. This paper presents the experiences of two students negotiating experiences of…

Building off seminal works on community including McMillan and Chavis, Lave and Wenger, Graves, and Wenger et al, the Institutional, Program, and Professional (IPP) community framework for online allows students, faculty, administrators, and alumni the opportunity to consider how to support community beyond online courses into programs, the…

One of the aims of PhD students' socialisation is for them to accept the norms of the teaching culture and to be fully engaged with and accepted by the university teaching community. However, when PhD students enter universities, they do not necessarily accept all of the university teaching community's cultural norms, nor do they all experience…

Scholarship on how fraternities inform members' sexual identity development is mixed, showcasing the harmful ways these groups affect queer members as well as highlighting the potential they have to be affirming. This narrative inquiry study sought to contribute to this literature by spotlighting the stories of 8 members who identified as…

Purpose: An increasing non-drinker population is developing, but much research focusses on alcohol misuse, rather than the experiences of those who abstain or consume little alcohol, particularly within student populations. This student co-constructed qualitative research aimed to understand alcohol abstainer and light drinking students'…

Past research identified various psychosocial indicators of college students' academic success. Using the affordance ecology framework, the present study explored the complex relations among different psychosocial indicators with a Bayesian Gaussian Graphical Model approach. Specifically, this study aims to uncover the general patterns of the…

Research indicates that historically underrepresented college students are more likely to report alienating campus climates which can contribute to decreased sense of belonging and wellbeing. In turn, a lack of a sense of belonging and poor mental health may lead to decreased academic engagement and increased likelihood of attrition. Theoretical…

Guided by a love politic and centrifugal intersectionality we demonstrate how whiteness, homonormative whiteness, and white heteronormativity alienates racialized queer students in both 2SLGBTQ + and racialized counterspaces within the university. The tensions experienced by racialized queer students, do not stem from the existence of these…

This instrumental qualitative case study examined how one Catholic, Jesuit university supports its LGBTQ undergraduate students and how those students make meaning of that support. Participants included 19 students with a variety of LGBTQ and racial identities, and 13 faculty and staff. I examined online documents, made visual observations, and…

Persistence across undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) programs is exceptionally low. Recent studies have shown that social support and sense of belonging are particularly important for students who are historically underrepresented in STEM, yet few interventions have directly targeted or investigated these…

Researchers have revealed a strong association between sense of belonging and students' social class and economic background. Notably, students from less advantaged economic and class backgrounds typically report a lower sense of belonging in college compared with their middle and upper-class peers. To address gaps in college completion, educators…

It is crucial that academic institutions offer support to their increasingly diverse student bodies. LGBTQIA+ students often report negative experiences in relation to campus climate and treatment. The aim of this qualitative research was to explore the experiences of LGBTQIA+ students who attend(ed) a collaborative (staff and student),…

Students' sense of belonging impacts their affect, motivation, well-being, and academic success. Sense of belonging is considered context-dependent as what determines one's belonging differs across contexts. This study explores how sense of belonging manifests among post-secondary, introductory chemistry students. This context is important given…

Belonging is an essential human need, regardless of whether or not one has a disability, and has been found to positively impact one's physical and mental health. Feelings of belonging for college students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD) have largely been unexplored in research. Using the 10 Dimensions of Belonging…