It’s well-known that higher education is facing significant disruption today–from political pressures to artificial intelligence. Some are questioning the purpose of education altogether.
But perhaps that question is precisely where we should start.
I’ve spent the past five years of this disruptive period reflecting on belonging and health–separately. Recently, however, I encountered an article that grabbed my attention because it united the two: Health is Belonging*.
I’ve spent nearly three decades studying the importance of social connections – for navigating grief, for grounding learning, and for bridging racial, socioeconomic, and age divides. I’ve also spent a lot of time in hospitals as a parent of a child with cancer.
The connection between health and belonging seems incredibly powerful to me. The Health and Belonging article helped me realize that in both medicine and education, we too often fall into an approach that views humans essentially as machines that can be divided into separate, discrete parts.
For example, one of the featured writers, Wendell Berry, prompts us to consider the body’s natural healing processes juxtaposed against the noisy clanks and interruptions of a modern hospital. Bodies that need quiet rest are too often treated as machines. The focus is on healing the specific issue for which the person is receiving medical treatment. Our efficient processes can indeed repair broken parts– but does this constitute real healing? Interrupting a sick patient three or four times a night to draw blood and check vital signs reveals a focus on immediate fix rather than long-term health, which might be best facilitated through deep, uninterrupted rest. A natural question would be: What is the ultimate purpose that the hospital is serving?
I encounter similar issues in education. From an administrative standpoint, students are problems to be solved: how do I move the needle to retain an additional few percentage points of students, which will improve institutional metrics, which will then draw more students, who then need to be retained…for what purpose?
Assessment is an easy bogeyman, and as an education researcher, I am certainly pro collecting data and documenting what is and isn’t working for the purpose of improvement. However, assessment for assessment’s sake, while losing the overall narrative of what the institution is trying to accomplish, is all too often a feature of modern educational institutions. This is where higher education consulting services, particularly those grounded in mission and values, can offer renewed clarity and alignment.
The Importance of Belonging
In contrast to the mechanization of healthcare and education, I could share myriad examples in my own experience of the powerful role that belonging plays in each.
For example, I know that my daughter’s oncology team is primarily focused on treating her cancer, as they should be. Yet when we visit, they take the time to talk with my daughter, exhibiting exuberant interest in her life–her travels, her musical performances, the books she’s reading, and the things she’s studying. Some have gone out of their way to attend some of her school performances, traveling over an hour to get there. They engage with us like close friends or extremely warm acquaintances.
What helped us to navigate a particularly challenging season of daily radiation treatment was a radiation team that promoted a strong sense of belonging for my then-teenage daughter, grappling with a new diagnosis and not knowing anyone else with this particular form of cancer. I’m so thankful for these medical professionals who possess incredible knowledge in their fields and also recognize that health is indeed belonging. My daughter’s health trajectory has been the better for it.
Similarly, I have stories of staff and faculty who may not possess the same level of knowledge or understanding of the underlying socioemotional processes that facilitate optimal learning as I do. Nonetheless, they live these practices, with almost an innate knowledge of how to connect with students. I’m currently working on a campus project in which I have to repeatedly remove the name of a faculty member to maintain anonymity because the students frequently mention her. She’s a STEM faculty member who doesn’t come across as particularly touchy-feely. Yet her care for her students is evident to all, and she is sharp and knowledgeable to boot. It makes a difference, and students specifically point to her and others like her for why they love their program and why they stay at their school.
These are the types of people and processes worth investing in that truly make a difference in the lives of students. And, as institutional research shows, it makes a difference to schools’ bottom lines as well, because–as we say on our website,**retaining even just one student results in enormous revenue savings.
While faddish trends afflict education as much as any sector, institutions would be well-served by investing in proven strategies–strategies supported by education consulting firms focused on holistic, student-centered, and evidence-based practices.
At Authentic Academic Insights, we believe that understanding the purpose of our educational systems and processes and investing in incremental changes that support this purpose will foster flourishing for students, staff and faculty, and institutions.
It’s perhaps not flashy for healthcare professionals to say that they promote healing or for educators to say that they promote learning. But if we don’t maintain a crystal-clear focus on these priorities, it’s amazing how many competing priorities can enter in– even those that ostensibly must exist to facilitate these primary goals (such as growing enrollment to maintain mission). The issue arises when secondary goals cease to be secondary and become primary, much like a self-perpetuating machine. No wonder we begin to see the individual parts, whether they are students, patients, nurses, or teachers, as little machines as well.
Education and Belonging
Like good medicine, effective higher education doesn’t reduce students solely to metrics or data points. Holistic academic consulting approaches recognize learners and educators as whole people—body, mind, and spirit. We grapple with deep and challenging questions instead of ignoring areas of inquiry because they’re hard to explore. We help institutions elevate what matters most.
Belonging means coming together with a spirit of welcome and appreciation for each other. We make space for everyone as we “stretch our understanding” of what it means to be well, do well, and grow—as learners, educators, and people.
Learn more about how we support holistic education and student belonging at: authenticacademicinsights.com.
About the Author
Stephanie Wilsey, Ph.D., is a higher education leader and consultant passionate about relational, values-based leadership. With a background in psychology and a commitment to fostering growth through connection, she brings a thoughtful, people-centered approach to her work with colleges, universities, and educational organizations.
___________________________________________________________________
*Stein, Edith, Wendell Berry, Teresa of Ávila, and Christoph Friedrich Blumhardt. “Health Is Belonging.” Plough Quarterly 44 (July 1, 2025). Accessed July 16, 2025. https://www.plough.com/en/topics/life/health/health-is-belonging.
