Move beyond individualized belonging approaches toward structural transformation¶

Strategy · All strategies
Evidence · no claims cited

Description¶

The article's concluding recommendation is that research, policy, and practice should move beyond individualized or superficial approaches toward structural transformation. It argues institutions bear the primary burden for creating belonging conditions, and that durable belonging 'requires more than episodic responses to crisis; it demands that colleges and universities resist cyclical retrenchment and instead build resilient structures of equity that persist, evolve, and remain accountable as social landscapes shift.' Practitioners can use the IEBM to decide which ecological level demands attention, and leaders to examine and shift policies, norms, and campus environments.

Design Implications¶

Context¶

Requirements¶

• Institutional commitment to addressing systemic conditions rather than positioning students as responsible for finding belonging

Constraints¶

• The article warns against co-opting belonging as a race-neutral alternative to DEI that maintains existing power structures

Target Learners¶

• higher education leaders, practitioners, and researchers serving marginalized student populations

Target Learning Goals¶

• creating equitable institutional conditions in which all students can belong

Affordances¶

• Iebm Intersectional Ecological Belonging Model

Related Strategies¶

Examples¶

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Key Sources¶

• Royel M. Johnson. (2026). Reframing Belonging in Higher Education: an Intersectional Ecological Model for Research, Policy, and Practice. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-025-10104-5