At the end of each quarter Resident advisers are expected to perform “wrap-up” tasks including: health and safety room checks, cleaning up common spaces, and lounge inventory. Despite many of these tasks being finished on Friday afternoon, Resident Advisers are required to stay until noon on the Saturday after finals. This poses unique challenges for those who are required to travel long distances back to their homes. At many points during our employment, the return date for Resident Advisors has changed or not been communicated until a short period before. As there are no administrative tasks that take place on the Sunday before break, we demand that University Residences reconsiders this requirement. In addition, we demand that University Residences establish and stick to a clear return date for Resident Advisers at the beginning of each quarter including Fall training.
We, as RAs, have necessary financial obligations that we must fulfill in order to continue our education at this school. As the RA position receives very little in the way of a stipend, we are demanding that University Residences allow us to hold other positions off-campus in order to make enough money to meet our financial obligations. We are also students who should be allowed to take part in our campus community. We should not be required to ask permission to make ends meet or take part in extracurricular opportunities that impact our experience as students. We demand that University Residences allow us to make our own decisions about these matters instead of dictating the terms of our undergraduate experiences and financial opportunities.
Allow Resident Advisers to hold off campus jobs and positions in extracurricular activities without having to ask permission.
Reevaluate the end-of- and start-of-quarter responsibilities implemented by University Residences.
Resident advisers are expected to meet with 80% of our residents, one-on-one, every quarter. This can be difficult to accomplish even in the smallest communities; however, the variation in community size puts a burden on Resident advisers that have more residents but are expected to meet the same goal of 80%. This is especially true when considering that these meetings are scheduled on top of our normal duties, which adds a disproportionate amount of work to Resident advisers in larger communities. University Residences’ current solution to this problem is to rid of the one-on-one program. We find these conversations fundamentally productive when conducted properly. We are demanding that University Residences evaluate Resident Advisers workload and better unify our expectations.