“It felt like my existence in the class was not a priority”: Immigrant Students Navigating a Sense of Belonging in Utrecht Science Park.

Abstract

This thesis explores how students with immigrant backgrounds experience and navigate belonging within Utrecht University Science Park. While universities increasingly claim to foster international and inclusive environments, students often report exclusion, pressure to assimilate, and institutional indifference. This study uses semi-structured interviews with six immigrant students to identify six interrelated themes: Absence of Belonging, Linguistic Isolation, Intersectional Identity Struggles, Campus Culture and Exclusion, Institutional Gaps, and Coping and Community Building. These themes were analysed using Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems model, Berry’s acculturation strategies, and the concept of conditional belonging. Together, these frameworks reveal how belonging is shaped by both personal strategies and broader systemic constraints. Students reported that integration into Dutch student life was difficult due to pre-formed social groups, language barriers, and the perception that international students were temporary and therefore not worth investing in. Institutional support was seen as fragmented or superficial, leaving students to rely on peer networks and personal resilience. While participants showed agency and adaptability, the findings suggest that these qualities are often necessary because institutions fail to address structural exclusions. This study contributes to research on diversity and acculturation by linking sense of belonging with layered institutional and cultural dynamics in higher education. It highlights the need for universities to move beyond symbolic inclusion and toward structural support systems that recognize and respond to the lived realities of immigrant students.