Hello Readers,
As many of my readers know, I have been critical of my college's Residence Life Office, or RLO, in the past. Specifically, I chose to write a piece in the college newspaper's opinion column about how many members of my graduating year felt like RLO's policies seemed to disadvantage our year, whether intentional or not.
Well, maybe that isn't quite accurate. A better way to put it is to say that after I heard numerous classmates express their anger and frustration that RLO seemed to be systematically screwing over our class, I felt like I should write something, albeit in a diplomatic tone, to try and sum up how many of my friends and colleagues felt.
For those who aren't familiar with the article, the grievances were basically that many of my classmates (we were all sophomores at the time) felt that we had gotten substandard housing, and that an entire dormitory of recently-renovated rooms, usually taken by the sophomore class, had been set aside for freshmen. In exchange, we had received the Little dormitory, which, as the approximately 100 students who had lived there before knew, was cramped, dated, and in a bad location. To add insult to injury, RLO planned on building a shiny new dormitory for next year's sophomores, and it would be the first time in history than an entire dormitory would be restricted to only one class (other than the freshman dormitories). There was no sense that we, as rising juniors, would have access to a similarly nice dormitory.
Understandably, many were upset. RLO continued to justify its decision by pointing out the lack of a sophomore experience and how the sophomore class needed a lot more in the way of unity and programming, but never offered any solutions to our class. In short, it was a lot like we were living in an apartment, being told how crappy and run down it was, and then being told it would be fixed up in time for the next tenant, who would pay the same rent.
Luckily, even as I planned to write a longer expose, since many fellow students came forward and told me their RLO horror stories, the then-head of RLO approached me and set aside time to ensure that I knew that we were not forgotten, and that RLO planned on renovating what we then called the "sophomore apartments" into much nicer, newer buildings for January of our junior year, for members of our class returning from abroad. The overall tone of the conversation suggested to me that RLO might actually be turning over a new leaf and working with the students, rather than seemingly against them. That spring, I discovered that many of RLO's office staff were moving on to accept jobs elsewhere, and the new leadership was helpful with any concerns I had, and I felt that I could breathe easy, knowing that finally, all seemed to be well.
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As the Chilean people learned in 1973, just because the old regime was corrupt, it doesn't mean the new regime will be any better, which is certainly a lesson we seem to be learning with the new RLO leadership today.
My college's newspaper recently reported on a story that I had heard about a month ago - RLO decided to fire three hall counselors for an underage drinking incident that by all accounts seems to be tame, to say the least. The summary is that one hall counselor turned 21 on the weekend before the second semester, and his friends and fellow hall counselors decided to throw him a small party. This party happened to take place in the lounge of a substance-free hall, and there were people under the age of 21 present. However, at the start of the party, the hall counselor who had bought the alcohol (which amounted to eighteen beers and a bottle of wine, hardly a huge supply) stood up and asked that anyone under 21 please refrain from drinking. However, two people, both hall counselors, did, and the area coordinator in charge of the building found out. All nine hall counselors at the party (who are all considered employees of RLO) were brought in for questioning, and at the end of it, the two underage drinkers, as well as the hall counselor buying the alcohol were offered a non-choice: resign, or be fired.
My college does have a policy that ties in to state law, which is that people under 21 are not legally allowed to drink. However, this is a policy that is routinely broken, and involves underage drinkers becoming messily drunk far more often than it involves a few hall counselors having a beer. Those students, if caught, generally pay a fine of $25 on the first offense. The people involved in the incident were acting responsibly, especially relative to the average behavior of many college students on any given weekend. Still, I acknowledge that "everyone does it" is not an especially valid argument. I have known that hall counselors in the past tend to get a second chance before being fired, but that is not much better.
Two of the three hall counselors were forced to move at the start of the second semester, which is a time when freshmen often need their counsel the most, especially at the start of rush season for fraternities. The freshmen on these halls may still have the other hall counselors in the building to turn to, but they spent their entire first semester coming to rely upon and trust their hall counselor on their hall, a relationship not easily built or transferred. RLO seems to have prized its ability to enforce a school policy over its ability to see the greater consequences of its actions. Just as my class was poisoned against RLO as sophomores, many of these freshmen have openly admitted that they believe RLO's decision was wrong, and they would never consider working as RAs or hall counselors now, even if they had strongly considered it before.
The problem I have with this episode is how opaque, arbitrary, and autocratic RLO was in its decision. The hall counselors called in for questioning say that the director of RLO explained that he did not trust many of the people involved. This seems to fly in the face of my college's honor code, which the majority of students would say is designed to create an atmosphere of trust among students, faculty, and staff. Without any evidence to suggest that the hall counselors were lying, this kind of mistrust leaves me feeling concerned, to say the least.
Furthermore, the director of RLO has "declined to comment" on exactly why these three hall counselors were fired, claiming that RLO will not discuss "personnel issues" with a wider audience. If these three were fired because they broke the law, that seems like a perfectly justifiable reason, and he ought to say so. The fact that he refuses to discuss any part of his decision does not sit well with me at all, and it certainly does not make me trust the office.
In sum, I believe that my college's Residence Life Office has completely eroded its legitimacy, having created not one but two major causes in the past two years for students to believe that, although it claims to want to help and support students, it is doing the opposite. Drinking one beer while underage should not be the grounds for being fired or for robbing a community of its major supporting figure, and to make matters worse, we do not even know if that was the primary factor behind the ruling. Regrettably, this is not a kind of democracy where we have a way of overturning the decisions or making the decision-makers accountable, but I think could be the start of a move where the student body begins to show its suspicions towards RLO.
Personally, I am living off-campus next year. It means a year away from RLO and its policies, and I couldn't be happier.
Cheers!
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