Fostering belonging in a CALD school environment: Learning from a research collaboration with a refugee and migrant school community in Australia

School belonging is fundamental to the wellbeing and academic success of culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) students. While the psychosocial factors associated with belonging have been well articulated, the ways in which schools foster belonging for this cohort is relatively unexplored. This paper discusses a research collaboration that investigated ways in which schools create and promote belonging. The study was conducted in an Australian school dedicated to the settlement and English language development of newly arrived migrant and refugee children. Digital storytelling was used as a research methodology to listen to and learn from the experiences of school staff, students and their families. The findings comprised three key strategies central to the creation of belonging at the school: helping students and their families adapt to the Australian environment; building socially supportive relationships; and fostering school connectedness. Through highlighting the key learnings from the research collaboration and discussing strategies for fostering belonging for students from refugee and migrant backgrounds, this research has implications for policy-makers and educators experiencing increasingly diverse student cohorts and working to enhance the wellbeing and academic success of CALD students