By
Brett Erickson
Arizona Daily Wildcat
'Lack of support' drives some RAs, CAs away from Res Life system
Editor's Note: This is the first in a two-part series regarding issues facing the University of Arizona's Residence Life. Part two of the series runs tomorrow.
On the surface, the University of Arizona department of Residence Life appears to be functioning without much headache.
It has added campus-area apartment complexes to deal with the realization that 700 more students applied to live in residence halls this academic year compared to last year.
Residence Life officials also found an additional 23 resident and community assistants to fill new spots at Parker Hall, Pima Hall and the UA-leased Palm Shadows and Sky View apartment complexes.
However, as Residence Life has adjusted to these additions, some of its former employees say one major factor was neglected - them.
"There's so many problems I really don't know where to start," said marketing junior David Lew, who resigned as an RA at Coronado Hall in December after three semesters on staff.
Lew was not alone in leaving Coronado and the Residence Life program. Three more of his co-workers elected not to come back for the spring semester, and a fourth was fired just before fall finals.
Similar trends occurred elsewhere across campus. Apache-Santa Cruz lost four of its 15 RAs - one quit, one transferred and two were fired - while two of the eight CAs at Palm Shadows did not return for the spring semester.
Official data for all dorms were not available from Residence Life, but Lew and Nick Benardini - another former RA who left Coronado at semester break - said between 18 and 26 students resigned during the winter break.
"I've been here six years, and I would say we haven't had a turnover like this in a few years," said Kim Bowie, who oversees RA and CA training and recruiting, as well as Coronado Residence Hall. "People leave for a number of different reasons. Sometimes it's personal, sometimes its grades, sometimes its other opportunities."
Finding support
But Lew and Benardini decided to resign because they felt RAs were not receiving support from Residence Life. Often, Lew says, administrators would make decisions without first consulting students.
Until last year, Coronado, Arizona-Sonora and Kaibab-Huachuca residence halls were all grouped into the same area. Lew said this grouping of the dorms, which are located within one block of each other, made it easy for RAs to conduct their mandatory programming events - such as group trips or community forums - for residents.
This changed last year, though, as Residence Life altered the system and grouped together dorms that weren't necessarily near one another. Bowie said this was necessary Residence Life had to reallocate its personnel and the number of residential areas on campus.
But for Lew, it not only made programming more difficult, it was a slap in the face.
"They do things without asking the RAs, and they expect them to work," said Lew, adding that he felt Bowie was one of the few Residence Life officials who made the extra effort to help RAs.
Benardini, meanwhile, said his frustrations with Residence Life resulted from his attempts to go above and beyond his duties. He was in charge of a wing in Coronado dedicated to students enrolled in the Courses in Common program, which allows freshmen to enroll in blocks of three or four classes with 20 other first-year students.
In conjunction with his duties, Benardini, a microbiology senior, tried to implement a feedback system so students could relay their praises and critiques back to Residence Life. For this work, which he said should not have been necessary in the first place, he received little administrative support.
"It was me taking extra steps that should have been there to start with," Benardini said. "I just needed someone to say, 'This is being taken care of, someone is getting paid (who) will handle this.'"
Instead, he heard nothing
"It was like, 'Oh, someone's going to do our work for us and we can sit back in an easy chair and relax.'"
Although Lew and Benardini grew frustrated with Residence Life, neither put the blame on their hall director, Becky Selleck, who they said did all she could to help out.
Selleck, who replaced former Coronado Hall Director Kelly Horn last fall, said she doesn't blame any of her former staff for leaving. But, she added, she has experienced nothing but support from Residence Life.
"I love my job, and I think it's a wonderful department," she said of Residence Life. "I know that my staff members did what was best for them."
Filling the void
For Residence Life officials, their main focus is not ensuring all of their resident and community assistants remain happy. Rather, they say they are focused on providing the best service with limited resources to the thousands of UA students who live in residence halls.
With all of the resignations this year, officials were left to fill many open positions within a time frame of only a few weeks. They first pulled students from last year's alternate pool, which Bowie said, consisted of three women and nine men.
But because some people on the alternate list had made other arrangements - as they were not selected earlier - Residence Life did not have enough people to fill the open positions. This forced them to rely on staff recommendations for students who could be effective resident and community assistants.
As a result, several freshmen, including two at Palm Shadows, were asked to return to school early and begin terms as RAs and CAs in the spring.
"Absolutely, we try to avoid that," said Patrick Call, an associate director of residential education. "In my ideal world, it would be junior and senior RAs. We do not want to put freshmen into that role."
However, this year's alternate pool was significantly reduced when some students were asked to take positions in one of the university's four new residence halls. This forced Residence Life officials to fill vacated RA positions with recently-trained freshmen.
"Is it better to leave a place empty, or put somebody in there who has the desire and is coachable and trainable in that role?" Call said. "There are some incredibly talented freshmen who are asked to do that, and they step up and perform beyond belief."
James Importante, a political science major, was one such freshman who moved into the role of a CA at Palm Shadows in January. He was planning to apply during the spring for a position next year, but the resignation of two Palm Shadows CAs gave him the chance to enter the role a semester early.
He said even though his residents are the same year, they have shown him the same respect older CAs at Palm Shadows receive. The one drawback to the job, he said, is having to sacrifice a small part of what a student's freshman year usually encompasses.
"I was hoping my freshman year just to get to know people, but being a CA now, you don't really have a chance," he said.
Residence Life policy prevents resident and community assistants from speaking to the press without prior permission. Of eight current RAs contacted, one would comment about his experiences with Residence Life.
This did not surprise Lew.
"They're held to a strict guideline about not talking to the Wildcat," he said. "They fear for their jobs in that way."
The RA who agreed to an interview has been in the department for two years and spoke on the condition of anonymity. He said he enjoys his job, but feels the system could be tweaked to relieve some of the strain placed on students.
"Personally, I think they have a lot of room to improve, but I'm happy," he said.
One change Residence Life plans on making is returning to the old system of residence hall being grouped into official "areas," which should make programming easier for RAs.
This is helpful, but for Lew, the change shouldn't have been made to begin with.
"They are switching it back, but that's just an example of what they do," he said. "They made it seem like it's RAs versus them."
