My D applied to be an RA. Every college will be different of course, but I’m trying to come up with pros/cons for her to consider and ask about if she is asked to interview. I like the perks of having her room paid and some wages too I think. It’s also a time commitment and responsibility. I’m interested in good/bad experiences and whether your student felt it was “worth it”. TIA
One thing she should consider is her particularly schools Covid policies and how comfortable she is enforcing them. Most of the negative feedback I’ve heard from current RAs is around enforcing masking, limits on number of students in dorm rooms etc and it factored into my daughter’s decision about applying last year.
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The pros are pretty obvious: free room and board. It’s also something that you can put on your resume. The cons? You are probably going to have to deal with some drama and be the bad guy once in a while, especially given the reality of Covid rules.
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The renumeration varies by college. Free room is pretty universal. Free meals and/or stipend is less common.
The cons. Probably the most thankless job you can have and playing bad cop gets old very quickly.
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She will need to be available to residents at times when she may want to be “living her own life”. She will need to be able to enforce rules, including one’s she may not agree with.
It’s a good opportunity to help classmates, build community, etc. Good listening and conflict resolution skills are critical and this is a chance to further develop those. Ime, kids who naturally have these skills enjoy being given a forum in which to exercise and hone them. I do know one young woman who became so involved in hall issues that it wasn’t great for her own mental health, but she did have the right disposition and skills for the role. So maybe your D should consider how she will do the job and set boundaries?
I think, in addition to the monetary rewards, there is often appeal to being in this type of authority role. If that is a pull, does she feel equally committed to empathy and community?
Personally, I would never have wanted to make this kind of commitment to a hall – iow, a group not of my choosing – but I also recall several RAs who were beloved by their cohort and clearly fostered community in a way that the community chose it!
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The biggest variable is your D’s temperament: how will she take to being the shoulder to cry on, the mediator, the problem solver, the enforcer? How much are RA’s expected to do at her school? One of the collegekids was an RA on a floor of first years. Lots of trouble shooting, support for settling into college life, etc, but she felt useful, enjoyed knowing everything that was going on and seeing the first years going from ‘scared rabbits’ (her term) to confident (young) adults. I was an RA on a floor of final years- super easy! One grad school admissions melt down & one pregnancy crisis and that was it. The rest was just organizing the seasonal set pieces. Loved having the extra cash. A daughter by another mother collegekid was RA, and then head of the RAs, over 3 years. She worked hard for that room & board but 1) she was really well suited to it- very calm, very steady, by nature a no-nonsense but kind hearted soul and 2) it was the difference of being able to graduate w/o debt and she was keenly aware from Day 1 what the benefit was to her for all the various drama she dealt with.
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Her personality is definitely the key. Is she already a natural leader that others love? This is what she will need to be - even if not always loved.
One of mine was an RA for 3 years, always choosing freshmen, and always loving it. Tales he would tell included being with an OD person at the ER, organizing trips to see the city his college was in so students would learn how the bus system worked and what “college student loves” were out there, enforcing fire codes, quiet times, and substance rules, and guarding halls/dorms during major events. He was always among the first in and last out of residence halls for breaks.
He loved his shepherding job and made oodles of friends from it. His last year he won a college-wide award for it with the voting coming from both students and staff (he won both groups). But among the tales he told were stories of those not cut out for the job, including one who ended up quitting because of the stress.
Don’t just look at the free board (all he got from it). Consider personality and job fit as paramount. My other two had no interest in the job (different colleges, but “same” job). That’s ok too. They have other strengths.
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Any questions you can think of for her to ask if interviewed? She is not one for drama but is calm. She will be a sophomore (with credits of a junior)and I want her to have time to have fun while in undergrad. I think she is a good role model but probably not a lot of documented leadership. It sounds like a lengthy interview/training process so I’m hoping those who choose would be able to figure out if she has what it takes. I don’t want her to get in over her head. I don’t think she has had much interaction with her RA and neither of us really have a good idea of how much stress is involved. She is not bossy or one who would see RA as a power trip. She is a good listener though.
I would not necessarily describe her as a natural born leader but definitely as more confident in who she is than I was at that age. She is (from my observation) on the quieter side and observes and not the life of the party. Like me, she has no interest in drinking/drugs or peer pressure to be cool.
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Make sure any questions she has aren’t already answered online or in any literature she was given. My guy hated it when others came to interviews and seemed to have not read anything ahead of time. I never asked him what good questions were though.
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My D considered it. She was having a less than positive experience with her roommate and was not looking forward to the drama that would come as part of the housing lottery. She hadn’t met anyone she wanted to live with (Covid, no in-person classes or activities) and was dreading having another randomly assigned roommate. Being an RA would have assured she had her own room and didn’t have to go through the lottery process. She ended up being accepted into a residential seminar program focused around a class just before she submitted her RA application. It, too, solved her housing anxiety and has helped her connect with a group of students that she plans to live with next year.
Everyone has different reasons for their choices. My D would have made any option work but for her, the primary draw was the housing process.
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Housing lottery is why I suggested to D in the first place so she would be guaranteed to get in on campus housing, but I’ve since learned that she has a good chance of getting in anyway. I have definitely cautioned her to find out what is involved. I don’t want her to do it if it will not be a good fit and take away from school work/social life. She will have to be the judge of whether she has the amount of time it takes to be successful in that role and have a balanced life.
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I was an RA back in the Stone Age. We actually received a stipend that was equal to the cost of housing….plus a teeny bit more. We also got a nice single room.
This is a JOB. If someone is doing it solely for the free room or whatever…they should not do the job.
The RA is the first go to person for all things needing to be resolved on the floor…between roommates or other students. Sometimes it’s not fun being the mediator.
On my floor, we had a pyromaniac…and yes, she set fire to part Of the floor three times before she was found out. All three in the middle of the night. Part of my responsibility was to make sure no one was in their rooms before I left my floor…I was not in danger but it was no fun knocking on all doors or opening them if no one answered (we had keys to all the rooms). In a couple of instances, smoke damage was extensive and I had students sleeping on the floor in my room for days.
It’s a great job if you understand that there is a significant amount of responsibility with it.
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In 2016-17, the RA’s at Scripps College went on strike in the wake of the death by suicide of one of their peer/colleagues. The stresses of being an RA were only one factor in what happened to this student - there was much more going on, and I’m not bringing this up to imply that RA’s in general are at elevated risk of self-harm! But the detailed list of concerns and demands that these RA’s produced are instructive, I think, in highlighting some of the issues that students in these positions face. Scripps RAs Go on Strike - The Student Life
There’s a lot of context not explained here, so I’m hoping responses won’t devolve into critique of whether the authors were being reasonable or not. That isn’t really the point, and in fact the RA role has been significantly overhauled at Scripps since this occurred. I just think that it points out a lot of possible issues that a person considering an RA position may not have considered, and could help them to formulate questions about how things work on their particular campus. Issues include both practical ones (e.g. how often might I lose sleep because someone locked themselves out?) and more overarching financial ones (e.g. how will my RA compensation package interact with my financial aid package, and could this adjustment make it difficult to stop being an RA in the future?).
My daughter had a HS friend at another college who became an RA, pre-pandemic, and ended up with schedule conflicts that tilted her schedule toward asynchronous online classes. This ended up becoming problematic for her, and she had to rethink her commitment to the role.
It all really depends on the school as well as on the individual, but the more you know, the better you’ll be able to assess whether it’s a fit.
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This is significant. The RA needs to know what to do in an emergency and be comfortable dealing with it. Even if not drugs or drinking you can have all sorts of emergencies. When I was in college my roommate was a type 1 diabetic and had a low blood sugar episode where she couldn’t fully wake up in the morning. I knocked on the RA’s door and she called 911 while I plied my roommate with sugary stuff. She had come around by the time that the EMTs got there, but that’s the kind of thing RA’s need to be able to deal with.
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I liked it. I got my own 1 bedroom apartment, for free, which was crucial at that stage, and I learned leadership skills. There were some unpleasant things that went on (a young white man from a rural town who made an official complaint that I was too openly Jewish), and I had to be the one to tell a girl that her father had died, and rescue a girl who got dosed with LSD at a party, and call 911 for a type I diabetic who was seizing from hypoglycemia after getting drunk, but these were all valuable learning experiences. Plus there were a lot of positive experiences with the residents. I think it helped on my med school applications, too.
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I think the pros are compensation, leadership building, and if you want a life in higher education, such as working in housing or as a hall director, etc. it can certainly be a springboard. You also make great relationships. It’s just a great job to spin during interviews - all the skills from motivating to conflict resolution you gain.
The flipside is - meetings, babysitting…does it impact your school? Also, while your friends are off campus having fun, you’re living likely with first years.
I personally think it’s a wonderful opportunity, but certainly not for everyone.
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No personal experience, but my D’s bf was an RA in his sophomore year. He liked showing freshmen the ropes. He is far from authoritarian and did it because he thought he would enjoy it. He is friendly and I think he felt he could help kids transition to college life. He is a mellow person. I think if someone is uptight and anxious, this is not the job for them. He didn’t do it for the room, though I think many RA’s are attracted by that.
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Thanks! I feel like I would not have made a good RA because I am a bit anxious about following the rules and a big worrier. I would have liked the nurturing parts of guiding and making door decorations/hosting events but I think I would freak out if any real crisis occurred. I think my D would be more calm in that kind of situation, but I also don’t want her to have to deal with those kinds of things and just have a carefree college life.
But what does SHE want? If she wants the challenge, let her have it. It’s hardly a dangerous job. 
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