A Sense of Belonging: How Student Feelings Correlate with Learning about Race

Authors

Cyndi Kernahan, University of Wisconsin - River FallsFollow
Wei Zheng, University of Wisconsin-River FallsFollow
Tricia Davis, University of Wisconsin-River FallsFollow

Abstract

Learning about race and racism can be a difficult process. Previous work has shown that courses in this area can help to increase awareness of racial bias and discrimination, but less work has focused on how that change occurs. We hypothesized that feelings of belonging within the classroom could correlate with student learning and our results indeed showed a strong correlation among these factors. Across three courses, all focused on race and diversity, feelings of belonging predicted not only perceptions of learning, but also graded forms of learning and increases in racial awareness. Results are discussed in terms of the larger literature on feelings of belonging.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Recommended Citation

Kernahan, Cyndi; Zheng, Wei; and Davis, Tricia (2014) "A Sense of Belonging: How Student Feelings Correlate with Learning about Race," International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Vol. 8: No. 2, Article 4.
Available at: https://doi.org/10.20429/ijsotl.2014.080204