A major piece of research dropped recently that I think every school leader in Australia should read. It’s called The Science of Belonging, led by Monash University and commissioned by the International Baccalaureate, and it draws together international peer-reviewed studies to make a case that – if the education system is paying attention – should fundamentally reorder the way we think about what schools are actually for.
The headline finding is this: One in three students don’t feel they belong at school.
And the research is unambiguous that belonging isn’t a nice-to-have sitting alongside academic learning. It’s the pre-condition in which academic learning is possible. When students feel valued, recognised and genuinely connected to their school community, their capacity to learn improves. So does their ability to manage stress, navigate conflict and develop the kinds of resilience that no worksheet has ever built.
You can read the full report here.
Here’s what I want to say about it, though, because my enthusiasm for the research comes with a genuine concern about what happens next.
The lead researcher, Professor Kelly-Ann Allen, said schools need to move “past simply counting how many students feel lonely and start actively designing environments that build their belonging.” That’s exactly right. And it’s also the part I’m worried will get lost in translation.
In my experience, when research like this enters the education system, what happens is that someone builds a survey or a framework. A school measures its belonging score in Term 1, compares it to Term 3, and calls the gap “progress.” Belonging becomes a metric rather than a lived experience. We get better at counting the problem and no closer to solving it.
Measuring belonging and building it are completely different undertakings. The first is relatively straightforward. The second is the hardest and most critical quest a contemporary school might embark upon – be cause it requires changing the daily texture of human relationships across an entire community. That work is slow, lacks glamour and isn’t easily ticked off.
The research itself is clear on what actually builds belonging: predictable relational care from adults, respectful peer cultures, fair and protective responses to harm, and meaningful opportunities for students to contribute or be recognised. It could be worth reading that list again.
None of those factors can be tasked out. None can be purchased, implemented in a term, or check listed. They are the cumulative product of a school culture that has been deliberately and consistently designed for and built over time.
This is why I’ve always argued that a relational culture isn’t the soft option sitting alongside the apparently more rigorous endeavour of instruction. It’s the soil that every instructional approach grows in. You can have the best explicit teaching in the world – and I mean genuinely great, evidence-informed teaching – but if the students in those classrooms don’t feel safe, valued and known, you will not get the outcomes the research promises.
Belonging is the precondition. It’s not the garnish.
The schools I work with who get this right don’t have a belonging program. They have a belonging culture. There’s a profound difference between the two, and the research – if we read it carefully – is pointing directly at it.
Keep fighting that good fight,
P.S. Join me for The Bullying Myth online workshop on Tuesday 27 October, where we’ll explore what’s actually working to reduce bullying in schools.
Want to subscribe to Adam’s Home Truths? Simply subscribe here.