Resident Assistants applied for positions for next year and underwent Resident Assistant Application Process (RAAP) weekend; some of them reveal the true stories of what it is like to be an RA.
For this year’s RAAP weekend there were 50 new female applicants and 15 new male applicants. This is a very low number for the amount of male students that applied as opposed to previous years. Also, more than half of the existing 37 Resident Assistants (RA’s) re-applied for positions in the 2014-2015 year. This is almost 10 percent of the overall population that applied to become an RA. The lower new male applicant numbers also creates a greater need for males from the returning pool.
An RA, as the job description says, is required to maintain a safe and happy residential environment. Each RA is required to sit on duty a certain number of times per semester, depending on the staff, and create seven programs that are geared toward their residents.
As part of the job requirement and part of the necessary requirement to re-apply, all current RA’s help facilitate RAAP weekend. They participate in group process as well as interviews of the new RA’s.
“[President’s Day Weekend] is a long weekend and after having so much to do we want [the applicants] to have that Monday to relax and so they don’t worry about class,” Resident Director of North Hall Jen Crespo said.
RAPP weekend is always held on President’s Day Weekend. This year the weekend began on Fri. Feb. 14 with a basic introduction day. A welcome speech and Icebreaker events were conducted. The first day was a brief meeting that only lasted a few hours but the applicants were put into groups and were able to meet the current RA’s, Resident Directors (RD’s), and Area Directors (AD’s).
Upon the conclusion of Friday’s event, applicants were given a homework assignment to bring to the next day’s events. This year, the assignment was to create an “inside- out bag” (A bag that on the outside shows the qualities of the person on the outside or that everyone sees and on the inside show the qualities that the person truly has on the inside), and to create a program that is designed for a certain group of residents.
On Saturday, the applicants and current RA’s started their day at 8:30 a.m. They were all placed in groups of roughly 10 to 15 people. The groups went through different scenarios, as well as evaluations of the applicants.
On Sunday, the final day of RAAP weekend, there were scheduled interviews with an applicant and a current RA or RD, lasting roughly 45 minutes.
“I look for people that work well with others and would work well with the staff type that I choose,” Area Director of the Pleasantville Campus, Matt Landau said. “A good staff is one that is able to work together and not have conflict. I also look for people that are hardworking and want to add to the group.”
For some RD’s, the passion that is involved with Pace is a strong quality that is of great importance to them.
“I think that college is what you make it and so many of the people that go to Pace have such a negative attitude toward the university as a whole,” Crespo said. “I look for someone that has Pace pride and really loves going to Pace. I also want someone that is very energetic, has good time management skills, is flexible, and has a positive outlook on most things.”
One of the topics discussed during the interview of a RA that is re-applying for the job is whether they are “burned-out”. It is understood that those being hired as a first year RA are less likely to be “burned-out.” They are a new and fresh mind to the job. Those that are a second, third, or fourth year RA have the potential to care-less about the job and more easily let things slide.
“Returners are rehired based on their performance as an RA the previous year. If we see drive and motivation in the first year, we hope to continue to see that each year. Most RA’s apply for the job because of the compensation, but you really have to do it because you love it,” Crespo said. “Everyone gets burned out- it matters most that an RA is still hardworking when applying for a second or third time.”
Some of the RA’s that are second, third or fourth year RA’s disagree, thinking that experience may be a better thing to have.
“I think that ResLife is so backwards in thinking when it comes to hiring RA’s. People that have been around the block and know how things work should have a greater chance of being hired,” a RA that would like to remain anonymous said. “They’re the ones that’ll know what to look for, know how to do a write-up, know how to handle situations, and know how to help the people that are new at the job. It is screwed up to me that experience is seen as a threat.”
Following RAAP weekend there is still much of the process that still occurs in choosing the new RA’s to fill the 37 RA positions and the roughly 7-15 alternate positions.
All of residential life meets in order to choose the RA’s for the next year. The RD’s have the most influence in who will be chosen for each building, with the necessary qualities of the RA being heavily determined by the type of residents. For example, residents that live in Hillside House or Valley are typically freshman and would require a different type of RA than one that would be chosen to live in the Townhouses that typically house upperclassman. In the end though the Director and Associate Directors have the final say.
RA’s provide a medium between the student resident and the larger authority figures of Resident Director (RD) or Area Director (AD), but this job may come at a cost that those applying may not be aware of. Manyof the RA’s interviewed chose to remain anonymous due to the fear of backlash that may be caused by speaking the truth.
“The [RA] position is a great leadership position however, what you do not learn in the application process is that there is no consistency between RDs, so if your RD hates you …or just sucks …or plays favoritism, be prepared to have the worse year of your life,” one of the RA’s said. “There have been so many RA’s that have fallen victims to this oppression, but this is also the side of ResLife that no one else sees. So good luck to next year’s RA’s, they are going to need it.”
However, other RA’s contend that the job comes with many positive aspects as well.
“The RA position is a great position to hold for an individual who is motivated to do the job for non-financial reasons. The job provides a great deal of personal and professional growth,” a different RA that would like to remain anonymous said. “In all actuality, the position prepares you for the real world.”
The anonymous RA brings up the reasons why RA’s take the position in the first place. Some become an RA due financial reasons and look forward to the compensation to help pay for housing expenses. This brings up the matter of whether the compensation is enough for what the RA is putting out. Some RA’s would say that it is not.
“The financial compensation is definitely no longer worth it, in my opinion. Residential life has consistently decreased the amount of Tuition Remission RA’s get. This coming academic year they may not give any tuition remission and only give RA’s a housing waiver and a meal plan waiver,” a third anonymous RA said. “Personally, I’m not sure why the perks continue to decrease when the job responsibilities remain relatively the same. With the master plan and all of the changes going on on-campus, I think RA’s should be granted more TR and additional perks.”
Some people, yet fewer by far, take the RA position looking for new opportunities, ways to improve themselves, and a sense of making a difference. There are also students that apply for the position with hopes of gaining both, the compensation and an experience that will benefit themselves, but not all look at both sides of thinking.
“We will all have to work in teams at some point, work with difficult people at some point, be put in difficult situations that we will have to handle, and many of us will put a lot of work into our jobs in the real world have little appreciation for it, similar to how many residents don’t appreciate the things that RA’s do in the residence halls for them; that being said, not all residents are like this,” a fourth anonymous RA said.
In terms of what the position entails, many see that there is stress associated with the RA job, but if one takes the time to ask an RA what it is really like, one may find an entirely different story.