So, at my school we are actually called Community Advisers (CA's) but since RA is the most common title used for my job, I thought I'd headline my post with that.
Let me just say, I love my job; it's a job that you have to love to be in. Serious issues crop up that you have to handle as a CA, from busting residents for alcohol and drugs to taking care of more severe matters like a mental health issue on the floor. They aren't very fun and in some cases can be very scary, but it's vital that we respond to them when we become aware of them.
This is my second year as a CA, and so far this year is going much better for me than last year. Last year I was in a freshman dorm and so I expected my residents to be super excited to be involved on the floor and the greater hall community with programs and bonding experiences. However, they weren't; they were very independent and didn't really want me to do a whole lot for them which I struggled with at the beginning of the year. I thought I was doing something wrong because I wasn't constantly programming and it took me a while to come to terms with the fact that my floor just wasn't interested in that kind of stuff.
This year my floor is the exact opposite. I am in the same freshman hall on a different floor and it has a completely different feel. While not needy, my resident love when I program for them and they are genuinely interested in getting to know me. One of the first days after move in, I made friendship bracelets with some of them and a little while later, one of them gave me the friendship bracelet she had made. I was completely astonished - that never would have happened last year - and it made me so extremely happy! Last night, I watched The Princess Bride with about five of them and it was just fantastic! To be able to sit down with them comfortably and watch a movie together was so much fun. One of my residents had never seen it before which made it even better since it's such an awesome movie - it's definitely one of my favorites.
I have a good mix of introverts and extroverts on my floor and I have a couple of residents who have already shown that they will be outstanding leaders - one of my residents was elected vice president of our hall council and two of them were elected to the freshman council of my schools campus assembly. I only have eighteen of them - my school is really small and my building has some of the smaller floors on campus - but I love that because it has and will continue to allow me to get to know them better than if I had a really large floor. This is the floor I dreamed of last year; even though my residents weren't bad last year - they were actually fairly well behaved - they just weren't looking for what I wanted to give them.
Long story short, I love living on campus and I love working for res life. I could spend way more time talking about this but alas, homework calls...
~Britta
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