Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Another Tuesday

It's been forever since I updated!!! Been really busy.

Tonight is our big event of the semester for Student Alumni Association. I've been working on it for so long, so I'm wayyy happy that it is finally here!!!

Nothing to exciting going on in the halls lately, just same old same old.

School is going well right now, but I'm definitely looking forward to next semester and to be done with these classes! (Especially NonWestern World!)

Speaking of school, it's time to leave for class!

Adios!

Saturday, October 31, 2009

The End of October

Well, October was a busy month. There wasn't a day in October that I didn't have some sort of responsibility to tend to, whether it was SAA-, RA- or school-related.

Things aren't very good right now. I've documented a lot of people, and there are residents with a lot of attitude. I just got done trying to salvage all of my residents door name signs (door decs) after someone ripped them all down, bent them, tore them, basically mutilated them last night.

It's really frustrating. I'm just doing my job.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Monday.

Hello! It's MONDAY.

This week shouldn't be too bad. I had an exam today, and have another class that I should leave for in about five minutes. Hopefully that'll be enough time for a quick update.

We aren't having one-on-ones this week or our weekly staff meeting, so my Tuesday should be a lot less hectic. I have some studying to do though, and a pretty important paper due Wednesday. No SOC class Wednesday, though, so that's definitely a plus. Other than that, things are pretty normal.

I'm not hosting any programs this week, either, but planning one for next week. We have to do certain programs based on Residence Life standards, called "Foundations." I'm hosting an academics-based program next week with another RA in the building for one of our Foundations requirements. We haven't decided what it will be on yet, but eh we're not too worried about it. Not a lot of people come to academic programs, so we need a way to trick them into coming, be it offering food or just changing the name so it sounds cooler than it actually is.

Haven't had any resident issues lately, which is good. Everyone seems to be settling down a little which is encouraging. However, this weekend is Central vs. Western, so things will probably be crazy. Half of the staff will be on duty for the weekend (just Friday and Saturday) but it still kind of sucks because that means we don't get to go to the game. The other half of staff will be on duty next weekend for Homecoming weekend. I mean, this is what we signed up for. We are supposed to have to make certain sacrifices. But we're also college students and a rival football game at home is a pretty big deal. I'd be more upset if I was like a senior or something and it was like the last chance to go to the game, but, in reality it's not that big of a deal. I'm sure we'll all just end up watching it on TV in the lounge. Eh.

Okay I've got to get to class. BYE.

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

It's Already October?

Well hello!!

I haven't written in here in a while and I have some time so I thought I'd update.

Things really haven't changed much. My residents are still pretty great, and I'm still liking the job. The only downside to the job is the feeling of no freedom. I mean, we aren't in jail. But, sometimes it feels like it. Especially when you want to do something, like go to the WMU/CMU game, and can't. But, we signed up to do this.

I've also found that it is very hard to live where you work. I like A/S and I'm so happy I received placement here. However, I have residents coming to me at all hours of the day. They don't care that it's 11:00pm and the only thing I want to do is sleep. They don't care that I've just gotten home from class and need to take some time to recover from a hectic day. They need help when they need help. Normally it's little things, like advice on an outfit or information about a club or other campus resource, or a lock out, but when you have 39 residents, the requests can seem daunting. I don't mind doing things for them though, that's why I'm here. If they weren't such good residents then I might be less willing to help them out.

I have done some programs recently. I did a diversity program with beading and that turned out really well. My friend (and fellow RA) Danielle and I put on a Girl's Night program that was a big success, too. I thought that programs would be daunting and hard to accomplish and that no one would attend, but we seem to be having a lot of attendance at programs this year. Tomorrow, another RA and I are putting on a Ping Pong tournament for the hall. I think that'll be pretty cool, too.

Lots of homework lately. But, I'm well on my way to that 4.0 that I'm after. Things are looking up.

Thursday, September 24, 2009

A Challenging Situation

Tonight I was on duty and ended up having to document my own residents for a policy violation. My residents are used to me being nice to them, being interested in what they have to say, watching out for them, etc., so tonight was a bit of a challenge. I'm not afraid to do my job. If they do something to make me do my job, I will. The rough part is...they don't like that. All of the sudden I'm the bad guy. It's okay when I tell them to quiet down, but not when they are actually documented. Normally when I tell them to quiet down I'm firm but nice. Tonight I feel like I was the same way. Now two of my residents are pretty upset with me. I feel bad. They said things like "Why are you doing this to us?" and "What did we do to you?" and "We're not talking to you anymore." It's not my fault. They broke policy, so they got documented. I tried talking to one of them after the fact, but that didn't go over well. I'm sure things will eventually go back to normal. Right now its just frustrating that they're so mad, when really, it is their fault that they were documented.

Monday, September 21, 2009

Another Day in the Life of an RA

Well, today was pretty darn busy.

It all started at 8:00am. Woke up, thought to myself "A few more minutes" and hit, what I thought, was the snooze button. Unfortunately, I was incorrect.

So, at 9:41am I woke up and realized "Crap. I have to be at class in 19 minutes." Normally on M/W I leave for class at 9:40am. And, lucky again, I had a paper due at exactly 10:00am. I jumped out of bed, threw some water on my face and brushed my teeth and basically jogged to class. I made it, and handed in my paper. Success.

The day continued as normal, class from 10:00am-4:00pm. Six hours of class, two ten minute breaks in between. Classes went pretty well though, I was very rested ;).

I got back to the residence hall and was informed that I needed to go to HR to fill out some form for my job. Nice. That walk back to campus was AWESOME. Sarcasm.

Then I got back, finally got to take a shower. Then I worked on my RA weekly report, and headed to dinner with residents. Had some really good resident interactions at dinner.

Then I went to SAA. It was fun.

Came back to A/S, worked on RA stuff like program planning, poster making, and floor sign making.

Then, at about 10:30pm, it was time for homework! Luckily I only have one class on T/R. Read, and now it's time for bed.

Busy day, great day.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

The End of Week 2 of Classes

Hello!!

Things have been going really well in the realm of 1st Shilling. I'm not sure where to start with this update, so I will just start to ramble and try to list as many things as I can remember!

Last night I held a "1st Shilling Hits the Books!" program. This will be a weekly (or bi-weekly) program where the residents of my floor and I will all study together in the Shilling Study Lounge. I started the program initially because a lot of my residents (at least 7) and I are enrolled in PSY 100, Intro to Psych. We had our first exam this morning (it was way easy) and so I decided to host the program for all of us to get together to go over the material. The program ended up being opened up to anyone who wanted to come, and 13 of my residents attended! It went really well, and those of us covering Psych went over a ton of stuff and answered a lot of questions. It was pretty fun, too. My residents expressed to me later that they felt really confident for the test. Realizing that for many of them this would be their first college exam, I went over some things to expect on test day (student ID checking, leaving after you finish the exam, etc.) and I think that put a lot of nerves at ease. It was great.

I also worked the desk last night from 11pm-2am and I will do that every Wednesday night. It was long, and boring. But one resident from 5th Ackley was working with me, so that made it a little more interesting.

The residents are still testing the boundaries with me. Two of them were documented for playing hall sports after I warned them several times. Luckily I wasn't the one to document them, but I'm pretty sure they knew I was involved in it. After the documentation, I had a talk with one of them, and just explained the policy again and told him that he was the one who made the decision to keep playing hall sports after I had told him not to. He understood, and I think it was really good to follow up with him after the incident.

I've started to see some really good friendships forming on my hall. I think my residents are really enjoying living on 1st Shilling. I have one open room, for two girls, and I've had some people talking about wanted to move to my floor. It's really nice to hear that the work that I'm doing for my residents and the community I'm trying to facilitate is appreciated.

One thing I think really helps me relate to my residents is the fact that I am very close in age to all of them. I just went through what they are going through now, so it is very fresh in my mind how they may be feeling. I think they feel comfortable talking to me about things because of how close in age we are. I have three residents that are older than me, and a few that are only a month or two younger. Lots of them are only 7 or 8 months younger than me.

Other than that not much to report! School is going well. I'm very busy...but loving every minute of it!!

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Classes

Classes have started at WMU! They started Tuesday, Sept. 8th. I have a pretty decent schedule, three classes M/W, 10am-4pm, and then only one classes T/R 9:30am-10:45am. 15 credit hours, so nothing too time consuming. I'm hoping to 4.0 this semester. We'll see.

I have Psych 100, Intro to Psych, this semester. In this class are at least three of my residents, and a lot of other residents are in Psych 100 at a different time. It's convinient, and I think I will organize study sessions with them. It's a program...and a good way to connect with them. A lot of my residents are really excited about classes, which makes me happy. Even some residents who I didn't think would be very excited about them actually are.

I co-ran my first RA program on Tuesday...Speed Friending! We didn't expect a lot of interest because it's the beginning of the week, first day of class, etc., but we actually had 20 residents attend the program! It went really well too...they were talking and laughing and I think they made friends. I had six of my residents there, too, which was encouraging. I'm co-hosting another program tonight, Showstopper Doorstopper, where we will paint door stoppers to keep the doors open so that community is developed on the floors. It's already showing a lot of interest...I hope we don't run out of door stoppers!

That's all for now. I already have homework to do...and an exam next week. Awesome.

Saturday, September 5, 2009

The First Weekend of Residents

It's Saturday and most of the residents are out of the building. A lot of them went home because it's Labor Day weekend.

My first duty night was this past Thursday. My duty partner is Todd, a second-year RA. Duty started out slow. We delivered some microfridges, check all the fire extinguishers, went through every floor, and basically made sure the building was secure. We then got a message from one of the other RAs on staff about the possibility of drinking on her floor. It turns out that there was an incident on her floor. We dealt with it, and Todd took charge while I went over policy and got the residents' information. We had a similar situation later that night on a different floor. We also experienced our first situation involving the police and EMS.

It was an eye-opening experience to how the year will go. We can expect a lot of alcohol-related issues to happen during our Thursday night duties. "Thirsty Thursday" is notorious for this. Didn't get a lot of sleep, but learned a lot, and hopefully if we crack down right now from the beginning residents will realize that their negative and illegal choices won't get them very far.

Classes start on Tuesday.

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

The Residents Have Arrived

The residents are here and it's the beginning of Welcome Week!

Check-in was definitely an experience. The freshmen came in to the room very timid and scared-looking. All the RAs were seated around the room at different stations. My job was mainly to talk about room inventories (checking for damages in the room) and passing out keys. We had two days of check-in, Monday from 9:00am-5:00pm, and Tuesday 9:00am-5:00pm. It was hectic, and exhausting. After they checked in the freshmen set up their rooms. Occasionally I could go around my floor and see if anyone needed help. This was a good way to meet the residents and their families. What was interesting about check-in was that we didn't really have problems with residents, but their parents were not easy to work with. Angry mothers would storm into the check-in area and demand immediate attention for an issue that really didn't have to do with the RAs...such as internet hook ups and the "safety" of the building.

So far my floor is great. I have identified some natural leaders who are very social on the floor. I have also identified some residents who are more timid and might need a little help getting out onto the floor.

It's really awesome to see the residents filling out their "About Me" sheets that I hung outside the doors, and one resident even mentioned how much she liked the door decs and everything I've done so far with the floor. It makes the 8 hours of work spent on door decs worth it.

I've got a lot of work coming up in the next couple of weeks. How things go on the floor in this beginning time period will set the tone for the entire year. I'm going to try to emphasize open doors and communication between residents. I've seen a couple of my residents talking to each other or eating together on a few seperate occasions, and that's great. The connections they make early on are crucial to how they feel about their living arrangements. No conflicts...yet.

Tomorrow will be busy...I've got work to do in the SAA office from 9:30am-it's done, then RA Olympics (the last bit of training) at 1pm. Then I am going to try to make it to the SAA session during Fall Welcome interest sessions at 2:15pm, and then planning for next week's programs and creating shopping lists, then Project RSO for SAA during Fall Welcome at 9:30pm-11pm. It's going to be a busy day, but hopefully a good one!

Sunday, August 30, 2009

Desk Workers, Bronco Buddies, and Marching Band...Oh My!

Today is the day where students in the Bronco Marching Band, returning students volunteering to be Bronco Buddies, and Desk/Office workers move in. It's been pretty busy this morning, and there continues to be a lot of traffic throughout A/S.

I've gotten some more residents! By the end of the night I think I'll have six residents moved in...perhaps more. They're all really nervous I think. They come in to the office and timidly ask "Is this where I check in...?" It's really cute.

Other than that nothing really exciting is going on today. We have desk training later tonight from 7-10pm. I'm going to try to talk with as many residents as possible tonight. One of my suitemates, Cheyenne, has moved in. Now I have to share my bathroom. Darn.

Saturday, August 29, 2009

My First Resident

Well, it's Saturday which means that training is almost over...thank goodness. The residents will move in starting August 31st at 9:00am. However, some residents, those that are Fall Welcome Ambassadors (sophomores and above who will be leading FW groups), front desk workers, and students working in the office, move in early. In fact, I now have one resident. This resident has lived in Shilling since his freshman year, which was three years ago. He's over 21, which means he can drink in his room, but his roommate cannot. I actually had a really good conversation with him the day he moved in (yesterday) and once again my job became very real to me. It was easy to talk to him, though. I asked simple but interested questions about school, his home town, etc., basically all the things I will talk to every other resident about. But it went well!

On the schedule today we'll be having our last centralized lunch with the other residence hall RAs and doing a lot of in-hall preparations. That all won't start until about noon, but I am up early to finish up room stuffers which are brochures, cable channel listings, light switch stickers to promote energy conservation and other simple things on the to-do list.

I'm not as exhausted as I have been, and I've even gotten used to getting up at 8:00am everyday. Note to Mom and Dad -- 8:00am is very different than the 11:00am+ I was waking up during the summer :-P.

Tuesday, August 25, 2009

I don't even know what day of the week it is.

For the past few (well, more like six or something) days, my life has been non-stop RA-related activities, as expected during our 10-day training schedule. We literally get up and get ready, then have training from, on average, 9:00am to about 10-11:00pm. We get an hour for lunch and an hour for dinner. Occasionally we get out early, like tonight for example, we were done about 8:00pm so I went and saw a movie with Jeff.

I think I have pretty much everything done...still waiting on my list of residents before I can finish writing out the door decorations and hanging all those up. We will probably get those tomorrow.

So far the sessions we have attended have been...mildly entertaining... Most of it I feel like is being way overdone, and sitting in the same chair for about five hours gets old very quickly. All the information is vital, though, so at least training is worthwhile. I've had a lot of questions answered and really gotten to know the other RAs I'll be working with this year. I've actually made some pretty good friendships, I think.

Tomorrow is another long day so this will be a short post, but I wanted to update everyone a little before it got too late into training.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Day 1






I'm all moved in! My room looks great...and feels so big since there isn't another bed/desk/person in here. Its great. I'll post pictures soon, if not at the end of this post.

Training started at 2:00pm today. It was just our staff today. We stayed in the building and went over procedures and duty nights and desk shifts and everything like that. Turns out I'll be working at the front desk every Wednesday night from 11:00pm-2:00am. Yeah. Not sure how I feel about that one. My weekly duty nights will be Thursdays. Things are actually different this year, and my duty partner Todd and I will have to do four rounds per night, the first starting around 9pm and the last around 1:00am. I only have three duty weekends for first semester, and have to work Thanksgiving. It's a little unfortunate, but at least I have family nearby :)

Well, I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed with all of the information that I received today...but my hall director is actually assigning me and this other new girl (we only have two new RAs in the entire building) training "buddies" so we have someone to ask questions without feeling dumb. Because the others (the 8 returners) we all first years at one point!

Okay here are some pictures of my room and my very first RA bulletin board!

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Almost Time to Move

This is my first blog post. Awesome.

I started this blog to hopefully keep everyone up-to-date on my first year as a Resident Assistant (RA) and just keep up on my second year as a Western Michigan University Bronco. My job as an RA will be to:

-Establish a positive learning community
-Create an atmosphere where my residents feel safe and happy
-Promote diversity
-Keep tabs on my residents
-Be available when my residents need me
-Putting on 6-8 programs per semester on various topics/concentrations
-Other tasks associated with housekeeping, creating bulletin boards and door decorations, working the front desk, having 1 duty night per week and the occasional weekend duty.

I'm pretty excited to be an RA...although I am apprehensive as well. I will have about 45 (+/- some) residents. A lot of creativity, as I've found out prepping door decorations and bulletin boards, goes in to being an RA. This year our residence hall has chosen to have a "Disney Movies" theme, and my particular floor is themed around The Little Mermaid, one of my favorite Disney movies. I've used the aquatic theme for everything in my floor so far. It's going to be a really colorful floor where I hope the residents enjoy living.

I move on Thursday, August 20th during the morning/afternoon and start RA training that evening. It's going to be an interesting year.

Also this year I will be starting my second year of studies at WMU. Besides being involved in the residence halls, I will be the Vice President of Programming for the Student Alumni Association, an organization I became a part of last year. It's a pretty big job...I'm responsible for planning all of our organization's events and making sure things happen when they're supposed to and the right way. I've already started work on our first major program of the year, "Take a Bronco to Lunch" which will feature the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences. We'll be bringing back WMU alumni to network with current students and hopefully answer their questions about different concentrations within the College of Engineering. It's a lot of work, but I can handle it.

All right, that's all for now. I've still got some packing to do before moving...in 2 days!!
Here are some examples of the door decorations I made for my residents.