Students’ negotiations of belonging in geoscience: experiences of faculty–student interactions when entering university

Abstract

In this study, we explore how interactions with faculty influence first-year geoscience students' negotiations of belonging in a study programme. We situate the study within the field of retention and use the concepts of belonging and culture to analyse our empirical material, collected through ethnographic fieldwork. We explore how faculty-student interactions during geoscientific fieldwork and in an "interview exercise" give students access to explicit and tacit knowledge about doing geoscience research, the department culture and possible careers in geoscience. The analysis shows that faculty-student interactions offer important avenues for the students' negotiations of how they belong in the study programme (who they are) and in assessing their future possibilities (who they want to become). However, while positive for some students, the perceived needs to be highly devoted to the discipline and to perform in the field poses challenges for other students' sense of belonging in the geoscience programme. By situating activities in the wider context of the culture of the study programme and analysing the combined effect of different faculty-students interactions, we find that institutions must offer first-year students possibilities for creating a sense of belonging that are varied, authentic and inclusive.

Understanding the Benefits of Residential Field Courses: The Importance of Class Learning Goal Orientation and Class Belonging

“…There has been little direct exploration of the role of sense of belonging in field courses. One exception is a recent study of first-year geoscience students that found that an early introduction into immersive fieldwork could provide a powerful feeling of belonging with the discipline ( Malm et al. , 2020 ).…”

A Resource for Understanding and Evaluating Outcomes of Undergraduate Field Experiences

“…Outcomes in the psychomotor domain could include: the improved ability to geolocate, collect and measure sediment in a lake with the appropriate instrumentation and accuracy, or use established methodology to sample stream invertebrates (Arthurs 2019, Scott et al 2012). In addition to considering these three fundamental learning domains, UFEs may promote student outcomes that span domains and enter the social realm, such as developing communication skills (Bell and Anscombe 2013), building friendships and collaborations Boyle 2009, Jolley et al 2019), and/or developing a sense of belonging in a discipline (Kortz et al 2020, Malm et al 2020, O'Brien et al 2020. Lastly, students participating in UFEs could result in broader, societal level outcomes, such as students pursuing conservation efforts, contributing to citizen science projects, increasing awareness for social justice issues, or supporting for sustainability efforts (Grimberg et al 2008, Bell and Anscombe 2013, Ginwright and Cammarota 2015.…”

Expectations and Challenges of First-Year Biotechnology Students

“…Some challenges are specific to particular disciplines or fields of study. Malm, Madsen, and Lundmark (2020) found that particular disciplinary cultures (e.g., the strong emphasis on fieldwork in geology) could in effect exclude particular students, e.g., those who were physically impaired and therefore not able to perform the expected practice in the field.…”