Belonging： Concept, Meaning, and Commitment

The feeling of belonging distinguishes by the need to establish links that become significant and necessary for an individual’s overall development. It emerges from the individual’s experience and interaction with the world. Sense of belonging should also be contextualized in school life since it favors the teaching/learning process and students’ motivation and participation. This paper tries to identify different forms of sense of belonging in the academic environment and their determinants. The methodology was a systematic review on electronic databases Latin American and Caribbean Health Sciences Literature (LILACS), SciELO, PubMed, Portal CAPES, and Google Scholar, including the studies published between January 2009 and October 2014. It is a theoretical study based on research and publications already accomplished in order to support a proposal for graduates’ monitoring and evaluation. It is possible to highlight some contributions that feed a belonging relationship between students and teaching institutions. Therefore, it is clear the need to establish an ongoing dialogue between graduates and universities. Indicatives observed in this paper show that lived relations from students’ admission time, in the academic environment, may develop a belonging sense and promote mutual, healthy, and lasting commitment. Thus, it is going to revert a constant update in its conceptual bases and curriculum organization for the institution, in view of constant changes in the working world. Also, it is going to allow continuous training and greater approach and commitment to the graduates. The study aims to develop a monitoring system proposal for graduates.