School belonging: Listening to the voices of secondary school students who have undergone managed moves

Defining belonging

The affective phenomenon of belonging is ‘complex and multi-faceted’ (Cartmell & Bond, 2015, p, 92), and has been variously defined within psychological research over a period of decades. Maslow (1943) claimed that an individual whose need to belong is not met ‘will hunger for affectionate relations with people in general, namely, for a place in his group, and […] strive with great intensity to achieve this goal’ (p. 381).

A sense of belonging has been hypothesized as a need to form and maintain strong, stable interpersonal relationships and a sense of social exclusion is associated with decreases in self-regulation and pro-social behaviour (Baumeister, Dewall, Ciarocco, & Twenge, 2005).

School belonging

Government guidance regarding supporting mental health and behaviour in schools (DfE, 2016) identifies a sense of belonging as a protective factor in building resilience for children, and states that ‘school should be a safe and affirming place for children where they can develop a sense of belonging and feel able to trust and talk openly with adults about their problems’ (DfE, 2016, p. 8). A considerable body of research, accumulated over a period of decades, highlights an association between ‘classroom belonging and support’ and ‘expectancy of academic success’, and ‘intrinsic academic interest and value’ (Goodenow & Grady, 1993, pp. 60–61). More recently, academic attainment, more positive interactions with teachers, and more satisfying peer relations have also been associated with school belonging (Furrer & Skinner, 2003; Osterman, 2000).

Dynamic and interacting factors identified as promoting a sense of belonging include adult support, belonging to a positive peer group, commitment to education and a positive school environment (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2015), other accounts focus explicitly on schools as caring communities and places of sanctuary for students (Antrop-Gonzalez, 2006), while pupils themselves identify peer acceptance and friendships as key factors (Sancho & Cline, 2012).

Although it remains variously defined in the literature, school belonging would seem to be fundamentally predicated on the experience of positive and reciprocal social relationships with staff and peers, and strongly and consistently associated with both the emotional and psychological well-being and the academic achievement motivation of children and young people in school settings. For this reason, Goodenow and Grady’s (1993) definition of school belonging as ‘students’ sense of being accepted, valued, included and encouraged by others […] in the academic classroom setting and of feeling oneself to be an important part of the life and activity of the class’ (p. 25) will be adopted for the purposes of this study.

Pupil voice on school belonging

Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which advocates the need to consult with children about matters which affect them, prompted a range of initiatives centred on obtaining the views and opinions of CYP (Lewis & Porter, 2007). However, only a very small proportion of the growing body of school belonging research seeks CYP views (Nind, Boorman, & Clarke, 2012). A recent review (Craggs & Kelly, manuscript submitted for publication) synthesizing findings from this small but contextually-diverse body of research produced four main concepts: School belonging and intersubjectivity; school belonging and knowledge, understanding and acceptance of individual identity; school belonging and experiences of in-group membership and school belonging and safety/security. The synthesis generated the higher-order concept of school belonging as ‘feeling safe to be yourself in and through relationships with others in the school setting’, positioning the experience of school belonging for adolescents as a prerequisite of academic engagement, motivation, and achievement.

Defining managed moves

In England, managed moves are advocated as an alternative to permanent exclusion for CYP whose educational placements are no longer considered viable by school management, providing a ‘fresh start’ in a new school (DfES, 2008). About one-third of local children’s services promote some form of managed move in their schools (Bagley & Hallam, 2015). Managed moves are described as enabling ‘a child or young person to make amends and to move on to a new placement or programme in a planned way which satisfies the school, the child and family and any individual who has been aggrieved’ (Abdelnoor, 2007, p.11), and as ‘a process whereby a collaborating school agrees to accept a pupil at risk of exclusion from another collaborating school’, emphasizing a relational and collaborative process at the school level (Vincent, Harris, Thomson, & Toalster, 2007, p. 284). However, Bagley and Hallam (2015) reported that managed moves are perceived by some parents and students to give schools a licence to move children they consider to be a ‘problem’, rather than working with them; that the process takes too long to negotiate and instigate; and that moves can cause stress for families and individual children.

Evaluations of the managed move process have generated mixed results, with some positive outcomes reported to be associated with ‘tailored support’, ‘care’, and ‘commitment’ in receiver schools (Vincent, Harris, Thomson, & Toalster, 2007, p. 295). Personalization and listening to CYP and families throughout the process have also been identified as key success factors (Bagley & Hallam, 2015; Chadwick, 2013).

Pupil voice on managed moves

Despite recent legislation, active inclusion of the voice of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) particularly those with social, emotional, and mental health difficulties is underdeveloped (Nind, Boorman, & Clarke, 2012, p. 644). The managed move literature to date has largely focused on perceptions of the process from the position of multiple stakeholders, with some including the perspectives of CYP themselves (Bagley & Hallam, 2015; Chadwick, 2013). Craig (2015) explored the perspectives of four students and found managed moves can leave CYP feeling insecure, different, segregated, and vulnerable.

Previous studies of belonging ‘have focused on definition, measurement, and importance of belonging without defining the precursors of the sense of belonging in school settings or its practical implications’ (Allen & Bowles, 2012, p. 113). This gap seems particularly significant in relation to managed move students, since the managed move process, potentially involving the disruption of existing social connections and rejections within receiver schools, seems likely to impact on these students’ sense of school belonging. This study therefore attempts to address this gap in the literature by investigating the following research questions:

How do secondary school students who have undergone a managed move experience school belonging?

Participant recruitment

Ethical approval was obtained from the University of Manchester. Participants were selected according to predetermined criteria: i) participants experienced integration into a new school environment as part of the local authority’s managed move process; ii) participants were attending the receiver school for a period of at least six weeks, and iii) for ethical reasons, it was also stipulated that any potential participants did not have ongoing Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) involvement. Senior members of staff from mainstream secondary schools within a children’s service in the North West of England supplied names of potential participants. The first four participants who met all stipulations were selected, as fewer participants examined at a greater depth is preferable for interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) (Reid, Flowers, & Larkin, 2005). Verbal and written informed parental consent and participant assent were obtained prior to commencement of the study. The background details of the study participants are presented in Table 1.

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Table 1.

Participants details.

Participant	Year group/School	Background details
Joe	9 School A	At receiver school six weeks and still ‘on trial’. His managed move came about as a result of him getting into a fight following an extended period of time in which he was bullied and did not attend. His parents had received a fine for his non-attendance and, although he had a good relationship with both parents, it had taken him a long time to confide in them that he was the victim of bullying.
Maria	10 School B	At receiver school for almost a year. She had moved because of difficulties with peers and bullying which had triggered deliberate self harm (cutting).
Jack	9 School B	At the receiver school for almost 14 months. He had moved due to being bullied and getting into fights. He had recently been diagnosed with what he described as a social interaction disorder and had had previous input from a school psychologist.
John	9 School C	At the receiver school for approximately 12 weeks. His move had come about as a result of clashes with teachers, as well as failure to comply with school rules regarding the use of camera phones. He reported that his trial period had been extended due to ill health shortly after arriving, and the receiver school wanted to wait to see what he was like when in full health before taking a decision about whether to accept him onto roll.

Individual phenomenological interviews (collaborative interviews with an unforced flow of questions (Major & Savin-Baden, 2013, p. 221; p. 359) were conducted with each participant. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed.

Making friends

Being able to make friends at the receiver school was by far the most prominent theme associated with a sense of school belonging, mentioned by all participants, and was positioned as an essential precursor. Comments highlighting the importance of friendships included ‘I wanted to move school where I could get some friends and be more socialised’ (Jack) and ‘I’m settled in now ‘cos I already had friends here’ [in receiver school] (John).

Feeling safe

A key way in which making friends in the receiver school appeared to promote belonging was by increasing participants’ feelings of safety. The link between forging successful friendships and feeling safe/secure in the receiver school was both explicitly and implicitly made:

Now I don’t self-harm… I’ve got better friends … most of them [the other students in the receiver school] aint the bullying type … it makes me feel safer. (Maria)

One of my best friends now (‘cos I was already friends with him), he introduced me to, like, all my new friends that I have here, and like, I found it comfortable. (John)

Extra-curricular opportunities

The opportunity to participate in extra-curricular activities and use existing skills to make a positive contribution appeared to facilitate a sense of school belonging for participants. One gave a detailed account of how she had been supported to apply for the role of peer mentor in her receiver school.

Now I’m a peer mentor. Yeah. But I don’t think they expected that from me ‘cos I was like new and everything […] They were bringing in applications for it. So I told my form tutor, ‘Sir, can you help me do this?’ He was like, ‘Is that applying for a peer mentor?’ He was like ‘Oh, that’s good!’ And he was like (‘cos I was one at my old school as well), ‘you could put that on [the application form] as well, ‘cos that’d help you get the job’ […] Like, I think it’s made me a better person because now I know that because I’ve been through things I could help people not go through it. (Maria)

Promoting belonging through facilitating peer relationships

Joe and Jack’s comments acknowledged the value of receiver schools’ attempts to promote a sense of belonging by the sensitive facilitation of peer relationships:

Well it’s pretty good for them to, like, pair you up with someone ‘cos you just get talking a bit. (Joe)

I met, erm, a teacher called [name of teacher] and, erm, she helped me find some new friends; she, erm, she showed me where the place is where other people like stay at break time and lunchtime … I had a good day that day. (Jack)

Management of trial period

Participants also spoke about the negative impact on their sense of school belonging of a lack of clarity surrounding the initial ‘trial period’:

And, err, I was off for a few days so they [receiver school] … they err … said that it would be another three weeks or something [on trial], ‘cos my attendance went down a bit because of that. (Joe)

‘Sole responsibility’ narratives

Three participants responded to the question ‘what could schools do to help managed move students feel like they fit in and belong at their receiver school?’ with what could be described as ‘sole responsibility’ narratives. These were elaborations of the view that there was little or nothing schools could do to help, as responsibility lay solely with the individual pupil. These ‘sole-responsibility’ narratives were most insistently expressed by John and Joe. These students, who had been at their receiver school the shortest time and whose placements appeared the least securely-established, seemed to be positioning themselves as entirely responsible for the process of settling in.

Well, they [receiver schools] can’t really help you with that [fitting in and experiencing a sense of belonging] because it’s all about how you present yourself to other people. (John)

I think it’s up to you if you’ve like made a good move. (Joe)

How do secondary school students who have undergone a managed move experience school belonging?

The voices of the pupils in this research offer some distinct understandings of school belonging. Belonging for secondary school students who have undergone a managed move emerges from the data as fundamentally associated with positive peer relationships, and with a sense of safety, security, and comfort contingent on having established those positive peer relationships. For these pupils belonging needs and safety needs appeared intertwined, and there was a sense of finding themselves caught between an acute awareness of the need to form protective social affiliations and some doubt or anxiety about their ability to do so. John and Joe managed this by relying on pre-existing friendships with students in the receiver school as a means of entry to their new peer group. Such ‘bridging’ friendships served an important function, particularly in cases where other friendship opportunities did not appear to have been facilitated. There was an awareness of John’s own role in ‘how you present yourself to other people’ as being important in establishing friendships and Joe considered that school staff could not force this multifaceted process by ‘push(ing) someone into, like, a group of friends’.

The ‘trial period’ seemed connected to the ‘sole responsibility’ narrative with a sense of a ‘fresh start’ being offered only after a trial period had been passed and of pupils bearing responsible for the process of ‘settling in’. There seemed to be a circular logic in their assertions that because sole responsibility for settling in/making friends lay with themselves, there was nothing schools could do to make this process easier. On the other hand, Jack highlighted that the head teacher acknowledging he was now part of the receiver school helped him to settle in.

Joe and Jack described how some school staff were able to appreciate and respond to their emotional and social needs with ‘light touch’ interventions (e.g. introductions to selected peers and information about safe and welcoming places to go at break and lunchtime) and these were described as having a positive impact on their sense of belonging. Maria also mentioned having an effective approach to bullying and a range of channels for reporting it which suggests that a fear of victimhood based on previous experience can hamper the development of school belonging.

In common with other groups of adolescent students, school belonging for these participants was closely associated with a sense of being accepted and able to ‘be yourself’ in the educational environment. Staff and peer acceptance is an important facet of Goodenow and Grady’s (1993) influential definition of school belonging, and is cited as central to school belonging across a range of contexts (Booker, 2007; Cartmell & Bond, 2015; Sancho & Cline, 2012). This study extends this aspect of belonging in considering how for John and Joe feeling able to ‘be yourself’ was rendered more complicated by tension between individual identity and perceptions of a ‘masculine’ gender role involving aggression and dominance.

School belonging also appeared to be facilitated by appropriate support for any additional needs, corroborating Bagley and Hallam’s (2015) finding that addressing any underlying difficulties is important to young people who have experienced managed moves. In the current study, Maria and Jack who had received actual or offered support for social, emotional, and mental health difficulties described feeling ‘safe’ and settling in ‘quite well’ as a result. Conversely, Joe who appeared to be displaying high levels of social anxiety, and who was not in receipt of support, had resorted to ‘keeping himself to himself’ in his receiver school and avoiding peers rather than attempting to make friends.

What do secondary school students who have experienced a managed move feel would make it easier for other managed move students to experience a sense of school belonging?

The responses of participants who thought it was possible for schools to help managed move students to experience a sense of school belonging were overwhelmingly focused on support for making friends, underscoring the high value placed by adolescents on peer relationships, but perhaps also the particular social vulnerability of managed move students. The suggestion made by John that a shorter trial period would promote belonging was based on his perception that it is hard to make friends when you are ‘on trial’, as you are ‘worrying all the time’ about your behaviour.

There was relatively little mention of school staff, but where there was it was in relation to commonplace school activities such as arranging a buddy. Other support cited as helping participants to settle in included head teachers and staff showing curiosity about, supporting, and encouraging participants’ individual skills and interests, positively acknowledging the successful completion of the six week ‘trial period’, and acting as advocates for managed move students.

The voices of the pupils in this study illustrate a sense of school belonging as arising from positive relationships with peers and an attendant sense of safety and acceptance. The pupils saw these as largely facilitated by their own endeavours but also acknowledged some enabling aspects of school routines and staff actions. Theron (2016) concludes that while everyday school-based resources and processes are potentially protective, important leverage points for supporting resilience in schools should not be neglected. The voices of these managed move pupils would suggest that an understanding of the possibly counterproductive effects of a trial period is one such factor. Pupils indicated how a trial period was anxiety provoking and a barrier to feeling settled. Additionally, the negative connotations associated with a trial period may influence how school staff perceive managed move pupils and consequently their daily interactions with these pupils (Armstrong, 2014).