<p>It’s a hard lesson for the kids, but if doing a rounds of the building was part of their job description and they didn’t do it they learned what the consequences of “at will” means as they head into the workforce. I’m highly suspect that kids don’t know how to use their swipe cards to open doors - and this is a lesson for all kids that swipe cards CAN be monitored. I don’t think anyone would think the the head of Res Life needs to make the rounds with these young people. Most managers would presume their “hires” were doing their job unless they found out otherwise through an audit or a complaint. Clearly the audit showed that the kids weren’t doing the job they were hired to do which has little to do with the head of Residential Life except that he/she perhaps hired the wrong kids for the job I’m sure it’s no fun traipsing around campus and in and out of buildings at odd hours. It’s unfortunate 7 of them lost their job, but it’s not a scandal or national news. It’s a tough lesson for those 7 kids but one that will make them better employees in the future.</p>
<p>Momof3, only a small portion of the population of RAs was sampled. According to the email from the Residence Director in the news, the audits are still underway. What if the remainder have the same non-compliance portion? Has anyone considered that? Will the school fire all of them, or just say well tough luck for those 7. Also, apparently not all dorm rounds required key access.</p>
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If you are a manager and half of your employees get fired for not doing every aspect of their job correctly, this is pretty clearly a case of bad, even negligent, management as well. If a manager is “presuming” things about his employees, he is not doing his job.</p>
<p>Where was the supervision? If this is so important a part of the job that employees are being fired without any chance to correct their behavior and improve their performance, why wasn’t this more a point of emphasis? Why haven’t audits been done in the past?</p>
<p>Do they realistically expect to find, train, and deploy new RAs with 4 or 5 weeks left in the semester?</p>
<p>If they had the capability to review the performance of this task through swipe records, why are they only doing it now at the end of the term? Was there some incident–a security breach, perhaps–that gave rise to this? It just seems weird to fire them at the end of the term without a warning. Do we know there was no warning that rounds needed to be shaped up?</p>
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<p>Yes, it does seem odd, unless there is a “back story”* that caused them to suddenly change from lax to zero tolerance about this particular duty.</p>
<p>*As in some form of serious incident that could have been prevented or noticed in a more timely fashion if the RAs were doing the rounds as specified.</p>
<p>^ If that were the case, the more reasonable approach would be to fire the RA who should have made that particular round, and re-train all the others to emphasize what they need to do.</p>
<p>It sounds like the RAs are doing the job of security personnel. What is the purpose of doing rounds? If they have to do rounds several times during the night/early morning on weekdays, I wonder how they get any sleep. </p>
<p>I wonder if the underlying motivation behind the firings was financial.</p>
<p>wow, I just got an update on this from my son’s friend, it is quite a story. I can’t/won’t/shouldn’t share everything conveyed to me, but ACCORDING TO THIS RA (lest it seem I am stating as fact) the card swipe/this is how we check your rounds system is seriously flawed in a number of ways. There is much more about how these particular RAs were targeted, the supervision and layers of (mis)management, it goes on and on. I am of the OPINION that there is no way something like this would ever happen in a “real life” place of employment. One young man with nowhere to go if he gets tossed out of the dorm (and who cannot afford the pro-rated dorm charge) is starting to ship things home and plans to find somewhere to pitch a tent, I’m not kidding.</p>
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<p>I am of the opinion that things like this go on in a lot of real life places of employment, and that a great many people get fired, all the time, with no notice and for no apparent good reason, never mind this kind of reason.</p>
<p>Hopefully there was a warning. Pro-rated housing is approx $200/week, so this could be a big financial hit to some families (especially if they were counting on it for next year too).</p>
<p>well that might be true Donna but at least they can usually collect unemployment and don’t have to find a new place to live within 24 hours, all while studying for final exams and attending classes. Oh, and while paying thousands of dollars a year in tuition to their employer.</p>
<p>what I meant was that one normally (hopefully) – with reputable employers – sees notice, warnings, probationary period to induce improvement first. And/or you see it coming :)</p>
<p>Just from the surface skimming I have done on this story, I don’t agree at all with how this was handled.<br>
However, when I was in college, and my kids too, many kids lost their residences abruptly for many reasons, and most all of them could find some place to live. My one son had two “hobos” living in his house and I, as a student, had someone couch surfing quite often. Hopefully these kids have friends that can lend them a sofa, or the floor for a while. </p>
<p>And yes, in the real world, you can be called into the boss’s office and be escorted back to your desk by security while you pack your things and are gone. If it’s for cause, you’re gonna have a tough time getting unemployment.</p>
<p>Whether one thinks the students were treated fairly, this was REALLY poor management. Think about it. 188 RAs. Sample a group of 14. 7 missed rounds and were fired. What about the other 174? They are still auditing RAs. Is the school going to fire 1/2 of them, or just look the other way. Too me, either the head of Reslife was looking to get rid of some of the them, or is just incompetent. </p>
<p>As a parent, I resent that tuition continues to rise above the rate of inflation. We keep hearing oh, there is a need for more administrative people. But as here, if they fail any measure of critical thinking, it’s money down the drain.</p>
<p>Anyone know what triggered the audit?</p>
<p>The particular behavior of the university administration makes very good sense if there was a trigger that raised very serious liability concerns.</p>
<p>Mini, an audit is fine. But no one wants to address my question – how can you justify firing SOME people before the audit was completed for “missing rounds” which apparently is not uncommon. </p>
<p>This system at NEU of having RAs have to go outside at 2 in the morning, across public streets in some cases, to check on other buildings is not safe. And to fire some people BEFORE the audit was complete is just wrong.</p>
<p>Sometimes there is more to a story than what we are told. I know a bunch of RAs summarily fired when it was discovered they held a beer party a few years ago. I know of some gym security/life guards also let go at a college. The news did not make the papers outside of the schools themselves.</p>
<p>“Mini, an audit is fine. But no one wants to address my question – how can you justify firing SOME people before the audit was completed for “missing rounds” which apparently is not uncommon.”</p>
<p>Because the audit was precipitated by another event that we don’t yet know anything about, but which scared the university administration, its lawyers, and its risk management team so much that they felt drastic action - including the flak they would take from it - was absolutely worth it, not only justifiable, but necessary.</p>
<p>It may not have been poor management at all, but rather very smart management, given the circumstances they faced. We can all speculate as to what that might be, but think very big. I mean, it’s a royal pain for the university, and they knew that before taking action. Think big.</p>
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<p>There are many jobs that are “not safe” that adults take on. I would hope that the student would read the job description and requirements before agreeing to the job. Again, they most likely have learned alot. Whether the job was “safe” is not relevant…it was supposedly the job requirements. Whether the college determines that this work is out of the scope for young adult girls and boys is speculative. Clearly when they wrote the job requirements they thought the competency fit young adults. Whether we agree with that or not is not relevant.</p>
<p>People get fired all the time…that is what being “at will” means. Whether the audit was completed or not is not relevant. They could let more go or not.</p>
<p>That said, my guess is something triggered the audit…either someone reporting that the RAs were not doing the requirements of their job or something happened. Bottom line is that they did not do what they were hired (and compensated to do). Nothing more. Nothing less.</p>
<p>Do they have a legal leg to stand on. Who knows without reading the job description, qualifications, requirements etc.</p>
<p>The RA in the article does not deny that she or others did not do their rounds. Also, students and parents should never count on RA jobs when planning their college finances - you should assume that you will need to pay for dorm rooms and food plans every semester of college because getting and keeping an RA position is not guaranteed. I know a kid who applied to be an RA in the fall and got waitlisted for that position - so there are most likely plenty of other kids who will be willing to take these open positions (if they decide to fill them now or to fill these slots for the fall).</p>
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<p>People are let go all the time, often for far less than this. People with mortgages, and medical needs that require insurance, and kids to support, who stand to lose far more than $1,000 and the dignity of having your own room for a few weeks. I understand that this creates a hardship for people, but it’s hardly a unique hardship and it’s not without cause.</p>
<p>I work for a school, albeit with younger kids. If I found out that some of my employees were regularly not showing up for work, leaving kids unsupervised or undersupervised, and still collecting pay for those times, that would be a fireable offense. Collecting pay when you didn’t work is theft. Not supervising people or places you signed up to supervise creates a significant safety hazard. It goes beyond progressive discipline and warrants immediate dismissal. This would also qualify as being fired “for cause”, which means that the employee would not be eligible for unemployment. </p>
<p>Now, I will say that it seems that whoever is supervising the RA probably wasn’t doing their job either. It may make sense for that person to face consequences as well, possibly the same consequence of losing their job.</p>