Next fall, the hall director positions in the three women's residence halls on campus will be combined into one job.

The staffs will also be joined, with all three halls holding large staff meetings instead of one in each hall, said Eddie Hull, associate director of Residence Life.

"We anticipate that we will have a full-time professional hall director who will be responsible for the combined women's halls, as opposed to now, where we have a part-time graduate student in each hall," said Jim Van Arsdel, director of Residence Life.

Each of the current hall directors at Maricopa, Gila and Coconino residence halls will be leaving at the end of the semester. A new director will be hired for the position, and Residence Life will begin interviewing applicants next week, Hull said.

There are currently 19 hall directors on campus, seven full-time, so the concept of a professional is not a new one. The new hall director will live in Maricopa, while residential interns will live and take care of emergencies in Gila and Coconino. They will be graduate students from the Department of Higher Education, which runs a joint program with Residence Life. Many of the current part-time hall directors are part of this program as well.

The decision to combine the positions was finalized in January when the budget was set for next year, Hull said, but it has been in the works for at least a year and a half. The decision itself, he said, had nothing to do with budgetary concerns, but was made to "take advantage of the unique and special characteristics of those three buildings." The budget will decrease slightly with the change, while the number of staff members will remain the same.

He said it was mainly an administrative decision, but that he wanted to talk to staff members in each hall, and that for the past month a committee comprising staff members has been meeting to discuss the change.

Since the women's halls are relatively small and have fewer resident assistants than larger halls, the RAs are required to be in the dorm and take emergency calls more often. Van Arsdel said he believes that combining the staffs will allow more rotation and sharing between the halls.

To build a stronger community, Hull said, RAs will do programs in other halls as well as their own, and they might go on call as well, which will give them the opportunity to get around the halls and share responsibilities.

The new hall director must have at least a master's degree before assuming the position, Hull said.

Residents of the halls have not been officially informed of the change, so many have not heard about it yet. A letter is being sent out this week to each resident so they will have the information before selecting where they will live next year.

"I don't think it will really make any difference," Gila resident Ellen Clouston said. She said she has never needed to talk to her hall director, so having an intern should not be a problem.

However, Coconino resident Sara Cole said, "I would really dislike it a lot. I like my hall director and she is great just to talk ... as an adviser. Sharing a hall director would just take away from all of the halls," she said. She also said the RAs should only have to stay in their assigned halls, because moving them around will confuse both residents and the RAs."