‘Wellbeing: a sense of belonging and connectedness’ an interview with Jacques van der Meer, University of Otago

Interview by Lynn Milburn, Coordinator, Peer Support Programs, Deakin University

I had the opportunity to talk with the University of Otago’s Associate Professor Jacques van der Meer about his experience in student mentoring and leadership. He has worked at the University of Otago since 2002, first in the Higher Education Development Centre (HEDC) as Senior Lecturer Student Learning Development and in the College of Education since 2011. As he talked, it was clear that Jacques was very passionate about learning more about how belonging and connectedness can positively impact university students to succeed not only at university but in their lives.

While most of us at Peers4Peers are passionate about mentoring and leadership and are involved in both research and hands-on endeavours, I was struck by how Jacques’ passion for both areas has allowed him to maintain a long-term complementary relationship between his research and his ‘doing’. From initiating PASS at Otago to developing an Otago University Leadership Award programme (which sits alongside the Volunteer Centre) that provides students with opportunities to be involved in the community, his experience feeds his passion for research, where he focuses on how student involvement in peer learning and leadership gives them a sense of belonging and connectedness, which positively affects their wellbeing, which in turn affects their success in studies and beyond.

His research includes being on the DaSSL project team and following up on the work of Jennifer Keup, who investigated the benefits of students involved in peer/student leadership related programs  in the United States from the mentors’ and leaders’ perspectives. Jacques’ most recent article, co-authored with Jane Skalicky and Harriet Speed, expanded on Jennifer Keup’s work to look at the benefits of mentoring and student leadership in the Australasian context. Jacques is currently involved in a comparative analysis of data from the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, South Africa and Australasia to look at the benefits of students involved in mentoring, using all a similar survey to the US one developed by Keup et al. The findings so far indicate how central the aspect of belonging is to students’ involvement as mentors and leaders in these programs.

Jacques stressed that the research clearly shows that students who are involved in peer learning and leadership opportunities at university have a great sense of belonging and connectedness, which in turn increases their wellbeing and that continued research in this area is important so that we have the evidence needed to ensure that these types of programs are well resourced. As Jacques pointed out, providing solid data to those who are higher up ‘the hierarchy’ will help them to appreciate just how important these programs are.