College Students' Sense of Belonging: A Key to Educational Success for All Students

Terrell L. Strayhorn. College Students> Sense of Belonging: A Key to Educational Success for All Students. New York: Routledge, 2012. 142 pp. Paper: $36.95. ISBN: 978-0-415-89504-0.

Student persistence and retention have been the chief concern of virtually all higher education institutions over the last several decades, resulting in an abundance of theoretical models of persis- tence and retention initiatives on college campuses across the country. Critics acknowledge Vincent Tintos (1993) pioneering work on a theoretical model of student retention while at the same time questioning the ambiguity of the concept of "integration" and the application of Tinto's theory to students of color.

In response to the shortcomings of earlier theories like this one, recent work has paid more attention to "sense of belonging," which Terrell L. Strayhorn defines as the student's perception of affiliation and identification with the university community. Until now, extant literature has lacked a theoretical conceptualiza tion of sense of belong- ing, as well as systematic and empirical testing of levels of sense of belonging among students. Strayhorn's College Students' Sense of Belonging: A Key to Educational Success for All Students is a commendable effort to fill such a critical void in the persistence/retention literature.

Strayhorn's text is organized into two parts. Part 1 consists of three chapters that provide an in- troduction to the research and an inclusive analysis of literature on sense of belonging and conceptual guidance. The following seven chapters, Part 2, are aimed at specifically illustrating how he used the theoretical construct of sense of belonging in his own empirical research on diverse student popula- tions including Latinos, gays, STEM students, Black male students, graduate students, and first-year students of color. In his introduction, Strayhorn comments that he wrote this book because he often noticed how frequently research data identified "fitting in" or "sense of belonging" as the key to staying in college.

He begins all of his chapters with an epigraph. The quotation for Chapter 1 quotes psychologist Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs to suggest that "belongingness" is essential to one's individual growth as a person and existence within a commu- nity. Strayhorn comments on his own experiences growing up as a Black male in predominantly White institutions of higher education and talks about how President Obama's...