Online Disconnect: Understanding Students' Feelings of Institutional Belonging during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Presenter

Jordan Cecelia McConnell

Campus

UMass Amherst

Sponsor

Caryn Brause, Department of Architecture, UMass Amherst

Schedule

Session 4, 2:30 PM - 3:15 PM [Schedule by Time][Poster Grid for Time/Location]

Location

Poster Board C36, Poster Showcase Room (163), Row 4 (C31-C40) [Poster Location Map]

Abstract

Amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, a significant pivot towards online education emerged as a means to sustain daily routines during a period of unprecedented disruptions. This thesis centers on the lived experiences faced by first year students who first moved to campus in the spring of 2021, and the challenges of beginning their on-campus life after an entirely remote fall semester. For first year students, this was their first experience with the physical campus. The current research on effects of Covid-19 tell us that students felt increased feelings of depression (Dafogianni 2022) as well as a sense of isolation and diminished social life (Mucci-Ferris 2021). Research on the first year experience of students tells us that the lack of a sense of belonging may lead to a student transferring universities, or in some cases dropping out. (Hausmann, Schofield, and Woods 2007).  This research employs a semi-structured in-depth interview methodology to study the accounts of undergraduates who began their freshman year remotely in Fall 2020 and then first came to a large research intensive university campus in-person in Spring 2021. This study investigates the unique experiences of this cohort of students to gain a greater understanding of whether students believe that the lack of in-person interactions affected their feelings of belonging generally, as well as their connection to the university specifically. Findings from this study will contribute to an understanding of the effects of online-learning on institutional belonging and help inform institutions as they consider the role of in-person connection in an environment of expanded online learning.

Keywords

First-Year Experience, Remote Learning, Belonging, Covid-19

Research Area

Public Health and Epidemiology

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