the residential campus experience · experience far-reaching shifts, and the institution’s vision...

The Residential Campus Experience

WHERE GATORS LIVE.

AUTHORSJennifer K. Todden

Mary C. Jordan, Ph.D

Calvin Mosley

Hannah Frei


SPECIAL THANKS AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTSFor their valuable contributions to this project.

Sallie Traxler and Alex AnnarinoResultTrax LLC

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INTRODUCTION 4

Executive Summary 4

Charge 4

Design Thinking Process 5

What is? 6

What if? 6

What wows? 6

What works? 6

ORGANIZATIONAL LANDSCAPE 8

Student Demographics 8

Our Facilities 9

Community Development 9

Organizational Structure 11

DISCOVERY 12

Overview 12

Research Process 12

Data Overview 13

Emergent Themes 13

A NEW SIGNATURERESIDENTIAL EXPERIENCE 15

Transitions 15

Physiological Needs 17

Engagement 21

What is a Residential Curriculum? 21

Generation Z 22

Strategies 23

Community Conversations 23

Embedded Campus Partnerships 25

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Signature Events 26

Student Leadership 26

Passive Strategies 27

Organizational Structure 28

LOOKING FORWARD 30

Assessment 30

Enduring Organizational Changes 30

Concluding Thoughts 31

SOURCES 32

Executive Summary

For decades, the Residence Life and Education component of campus housing has maintained a steady structure and purpose, with only minor revision. It has program requirements and models, room condition inventories, student conduct processes and standards, residence hall government systems, crisis intervention consultants, residence directors, residence life coordinators, assistant directors, and directors. While departments have made continuous improvements over the years – they have been incremental in nature: Change a title, adjust a process, and revise dates for each of the sub functions. Broad-sweeping change has not occurred. Meanwhile, the traits and trends of students (as well as their parents and families) continue to change, higher education continues to experience far-reaching shifts, and the institution’s vision continues to reach to greater heights.

Metamorphosis, a Residence Life and Education innovation project, utilized a design-thinking process to meet a charge put forth by the Associate Vice President of Student Affairs, Norbert W. Dunkel:

…It is time to review RLE as a whole. Is RLE structured, purposed, and designed for today/tomorrow’s University of Florida resident student? What type of personnel support will be necessary? What type of academic relationship will exist? What will be required to support and education up to 10,000 resident students and their families at the University of Florida?...

Framed by the Designing for Growth process that asks “What is? What if? What wows? and What works?,” a multi-year study and strategic approach allowed our team to identify and execute substantial shifts in programs, personnel, partnerships, and facilities to best serve today’s UF student.

Approach

In the Fall of 2015, the Residence Life and Education team in the Department of Housing at the University of Florida mobilized to meet the Metamorphosis charge shared by Norbert W. Dunkel, Associate Vice President for Student Affairs.

From July to October 2015 the team explored the experiences of students living on campus through the use of ethnographic research. Additionally, the Director of Housing for Operations

conducted an environmental scan, examining data, trends and forecasts of future students and higher education. A multi-disciplinary team involved in qualitative research, user experience strategy, project management and administrative support worked under the strategic guidance of the Steering Committee to design and execute a qualitative research plan. The research was designed to provide a concrete and detailed understanding of how students live and learn on campus:

• How students experience pre-arrival, move-in, transition and stabilization in their college experience, specifically for those students who choose to live on campus

• The range of factors and events that impact a student’s experience living on campus

• How students conceive and experience their interactions with the staff, programs and resources affiliated with the Department of Housing and Residence Life and Education

As work progressed into the Summer of 2016 and beyond, it quickly became apparent that the project’s outcomes would need to include areas other than Residence Life and Education: Facilities, Security, Information Technology, and Communications have responsibility for areas crucial to residents’ experience.

At its heart, the Metamorphosis Project is a project that is designed to build off the existing strengths and assets of Residence Life and Education, the Department of Housing, and UF students themselves.

Membership

A project of this size required an investment from many people, at all levels within the organization and from external partners and stakeholders. Over 100 staff, students, parents, community partners, and thought leaders participated in the project, taking on various roles. Students and parents formed the core of the research participants, with voices from custodial staff, residence life staff, and professional partners also represented. Thought leaders – experts with longevity from within the field of student affairs – provided context and regional perspective. Eight resident assistants provided in-depth interviews, including video diaries detailing their day-to-day interactions with students and the impact of their role on the lives of those in their charge. The research team also conducted focus groups with custodial staff, professional residence life staff, and key partners. As the project gathered steam, two additional sets of voices were identified that would prove valuable: parents of incoming and current students, and graduate-level staff members. A design session and an insights session brought in the voices of approximately 40 full-time staff and students; a working group of 20 housing staff continued to meet weekly over the next year to bring ideas to action. Finally, the steering committee of three Housing staff plus outside consultants kept the project moving forward and working to meet deadlines.

Design Thinking Process

Metamorphosis utilizes a design-thinking process (Liedtka, Ogilve, & Brozenske, 2011) to meet the charge of Associate Vice President of Student Affairs, Norbert W. Dunkel. The project is led by a Steering Committee comprised of Calvin Mosley, director of residence life and education, Jennifer Todden, associate director of facilities management, Dr. Mary Jordan, associate director for residential education, and Sallie Traxler, consulting strategic thought partner. UF Housing staff, key stakeholders and industry experts are engaged throughout the project.

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INTRODUCTION

Metamorphosis follows the Designing for Growth (D4G) process that asks “What is? What if? What wows? and What works?”

What is?

A mixed method research design, further described the in the next section, explored three overarching questions to help the Steering Committee establish an unbiased and rich depiction of the landscape of Residence Life and Education:




What if?

The focus on themes and trends developed in the insights meeting were used by a growing number of stakeholders that included a diverse set of students, faculty, staff from across campus and community members in a design session February 8 and 9, 2016. “During this stage, we start to consider new possibilities, trends and uncertainties. We start to envision what a desirable future might look like. This stage leverages what we’ve learned in the first stage to imagine these possibilities” (Innovation Management, 2013).

During the design session participants worked individually and in small teams to ground themselves in the findings that emerged from What is?, identify challenges, brainstorm ideas, and begin developing solutions. The design session culminated in the development of 32 concepts and an additional one-hundred or so ideas that can be further shaped and combined in the next phase of the project.

What wows?

Concepts generated from the design session were used by interdisciplinary work teams, including students, to develop priority concepts, test assumptions, built prototypes and run learning launches to gather feedback from shareholders. The What wows? phase of Metamorphosis identified which strategies and tactics most effectively align with the institutional mission to impact recruitment, retention and persistence to graduation for the University of Florida’s on-campus students. Three overarching areas of impact were identified, addressing residents’ physiological, transition, and engagement needs.

What works?

Feedback gathered in the previous stage was utilized to make changes to processes, increase visibility of concepts, and bring new partners on board. Testing and adjusting according to feedback are an integral part of the design-thinking process, and the ability to be nimble in prototyping ideas has resulted in a significant cultural shift for the organization. Too often in the past, a fear of failing prohibited growth and innovation in service delivery to students; viewing failure as an opportunity to learn has removed the fear and created opportunities to design something even better.

This project has created a significant opportunity for Housing and Residence Education to become a design-thinking organization and continue to position ourselves as committed and qualified to meet the needs of our current and future students as well as their family members. The result is a new identity, approach, and organizational structure for Residence Life and Education.

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Student Demographics

Higher education in general, and the University of Florida in particular, are pivoting to accommodate the needs of “Generation Z,” the traditionally-aged college students now showing up on campuses around the country. Born from 1995-2012, these students are the first true generation of “digital natives;” 95% of them are consistent users of the internet. Additionally, members of this generation tend to have shorter attention spans and are confident multi-taskers; this affects how messages are best received, with students preferring short messaging (Elmore, 2015).

Two other characteristics of Generation Z will have a major impact on housing and residence life: first, students belonging to Generation Z are coming to college with their community already established; and second, environments that are set up to support collaboration and connection will allow Generation Z students to thrive.

Students coming to college with an already-established community has a major impact on the role of residence life. Targeted social network pages, the ubiquitous nature of digital communication, and the need to feel connected drive many students to find roommates online, search out their hall or classmates, and build their peer group before the semester begins. The key for the future of residence life will be not only tapping into the existing networks, but also to help students grow and deepen the connections with peers they have “met” digitally prior to arriving on campus.

The need for collaborative environments has impact on facility design and potential modification. Importantly, collaboration does not always occur in person and the variety of digital platforms that allow for shared work increase the need for robust, reliable internet access. Cooperative work in-person can also be supported by building or renovating work and living space that is intentionally designed: available outlets, furniture with generous work space, easy connectivity to fixed monitors, lightweight but heavy-duty chairs that can be re-arranged easily, and the like.

In addition to the general characteristics of Generation Z students, the student body population of the University of Florida is changing as well. The undergraduate student population continues to be more and more diverse, with 42.5% of the student population self-reporting as non-white (University of Florida Institutional Planning & Research, 2018). Nearly 10,000 undergraduate

students – almost one-third of the total undergraduate population -- come from the culturally- and ethnically-diverse south Florida counties of Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade. Moreover, the University of Florida is increasingly serving out-of-state and international students; in Fall 2017, there were 3,497 out-of-state undergraduate students and 6,893 international students, representing 8% and 16% of the undergraduate student body respectively. Out-of-state and international students come with some unique considerations; with the ability to return home limited, storage space and the ability to receive packages in the residence hall become more important. The role of the residence life staff member may become more important as these students work through feelings of homesickness, isolation and even culture shock during their first semester.

Finally, the University of Florida is moving toward a position of national preeminence, having achieved Top Ten Public University status in 2018 (US News & World Report Top Ten Public Universities 2018, 2018) and aspiring to Top Five status. High-achieving students, who are attracted by top ten status, may need more resources in the form of mental health support, academically-based programs, and access to meaningful career exploration and development opportunities.

Our Facilities

The University of Florida’s Department of Housing is comprised of over 3.2 million square feet of buildings, including residence halls, apartments and office spaces. There are 26 different residence halls or complexes, with an average age of 58 years. Housing nearly 8,000 undergraduate students, our residence halls contain traditional doubles and singles, as well as more modern suites and apartments. Approximately 5200 of our residents are first-year students, with the balance being returning students. The majority of the returning students cluster in the historic Murphree area, the apartment-style Keys Complex, and the newer suite-style Cypress Hall; first-year students predominantly populate the remaining buildings and spaces. There is no live-on requirement at the University of Florida, so every student who lives on campus has done so by choice. Dining plans are not required for students either, and every student who lives in the residence halls has access to a kitchen; many students do use the kitchens for preparing simple meals. The majority of the residence halls have dedicated common study space, as well as gathering space, and some house unique spaces (such as a naval ship simulator in Tolbert Hall) or collaborative partner space (like Gatorwell Health Promotion Offices in the Springs Complex and Jennings Halls.)

Community Development

Prior to beginning the Metamorphosis Project, community development as a function of residence life and education looked very similar to how it looks on many college campuses: content was driven by student staff, requirements were a series of boxes to check off, some minor changes based on facility type or population in a certain area. In terms of the student experience, residential areas were relatively independent; some shared identity may exist among students who live in a particular building or floor, but little effort was made to create a feeling of community campus-wide. Traditional programs – with a stated date and time, formal beginning, middle and end, typically in the evening, often with food – were the norm and varied greatly in quality. Professional staff, and in most instances graduate staff, were rarely if ever involved in the planning and executing of formal community development efforts. Workshops designed to facilitate student learning about areas, resources and opportunities were scheduled when it was convenient for the presenter.

ORGANIZATIONAL LANDSCAPE

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The EBI/Skyfactor Satisfaction Survey was administered on campus in the spring of 2016; this data provided a good benchmark for future improvements as a part of the Metamorphosis Project. Students living in the halls reported an average to slightly above average degree of satisfaction with their experience living on campus (Skyfactor Program Assessments, 2016). Additionally, students reported a high degree of satisfaction with their student staff member (RA), particularly with respect to helping with problems and treating everyone fairly. Students also reported high satisfaction with timeliness of repairs, with the staff who clean the building, and with their sense of safety within the hall.

Questions 2016 2014

Q32 Overall, how satisfied are you with the performance of your staff member? 5.91 N/A

Q45 How satisfied are you with the cleaning staff? 5.86 5.94

Q46 How satisfied are you with the timeliness of repairs? 5.52 5.51

Q97 Are you satisfied with your on-campus housing experience this year? 4.81 5.18

Data from the 2016 survey did not look as positive when compared to previous years, however; the overall satisfaction with the experience of living on campus was trending downward, and students shared high levels of frustration with cleanliness of the buildings and the availability of wireless internet service. Although the ability to meet other people was still rated fairly high, this metric had also decreased over the past several years. Two other areas of potential growth stood out from the data: the connections of students to the living-learning communities and the support offered from these programs.

RLE Organizational Structure

For several years, the Residence Life & Education portion of the University of Florida’s Department of Housing followed a traditional, hierarchical staffing model for residence life; workload divisions were structured geographically, with leadership staff taking on some of the functional area support. Each floor had an assigned Resident Assistant (RA), with several RAs reporting to a graduate-level Hall Director for the building or complex; the student-to-RA ration was around 1:38. Full-time Area Coordinators managed groups of hall directors and reported to an Assistant Director for their geographical side of campus. Residence Life staff in the residence halls have worn multiple hats, including student outreach, conduct, discipline, event planning, serving as a resource, leading programmatic efforts, and making sure the facility was prepared for students.

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Overview

A multi-pronged and robust methodology addressed three overarching research objectives:




Research Process

This project is grounded in research and assessment data to examine the impact of residence life and education on student development and learning on campus. Large data sources such as the Skyfactor (formerly known as EBI) assessments and the NASPA Consortium Data were analyzed along with local studies of GPA and student demographics to provide the Steering Committee with significant information. This quantitative data concluded that students living in campus housing benefit from living on campus in their learning and development, and residence life and education has significant impact on students in campus housing. In addition, campus housing contributes to higher GPA and retention rates.

The qualitative research, led by Alex Wills, consulting ethnographer, involved more than 60 hours of participant observation, focus groups and unstructured, open-ended interviews with more than 40 participants. The research occurred throughout campus and at the Association of College and University Housing Officers- International (ACUHO-I) Annual Conference and Exposition. Students represented more than half of total participants. The research was approved through the University of Florida’s Institutional Review Board.

Observations and on-campus interviews occurred with students in their first, second, fourth and fifth years in housing. Students represented diversity in demographics, building style and campus location. Focus groups occurred with professional staff from Residence Life and Education, Student Learning and Engagement, Main Housing Office, Graduate Staff and Building Services. Thought leader interviews occurred with a group of senior executives from national and international

universities, both public and private institutions, a privatized housing company, and consultant from the industry that were identified by the associate vice president as innovators in Housing and Residence Education. Research also included observations of students and their families at Preview and during move in.

Data Overview

The findings of the environmental scan and research were presented to a group of 30 students and staff from throughout the housing organization and Career Connections Center in December 2015. The data revealed key traits and trends of GenZ, the next wave of incoming students, as well as insight into the shifts emerging in higher education. Overall, the environmental scan revealed:

• The next generation is unique, and standard delivery of education is shifting

• The UF student demographic will continue to change (with reductions in white students, increase in Hispanic, Asian, out of state and international students).

Through a facilitated process and by diving into the research findings, insights meeting participants developed a set of actionable insights around the experiences of students living on campus. Two additional recap sessions were held with the HRE Management Team in January 2016. These additional 52 stakeholders prioritized the following actionable insights.

• Prospective students feel overwhelmed by the amount of information available and amount of time to make a decision

• The need to belong to a group is paramount for all people

• When the experience does not align with expectations, even in a small way, this has a high impact on our students

• Facilities are crucial components of positive residents’ experience

These actionable insights were prioritized to support the Department of Housing and Residence Education around two guiding priorities which stakeholders identified from the research:

• Re-evaluate the role of the paraprofessional live-in student staff

• Align values, vision, purpose with students’ needs and the institution’s new strategic plan

Emergent Themes

From the research emerged three central domains where high impact and high opportunity converged. Students’ physiological, transition, and sustained engagement needs serve as the umbrella areas for the new University of Florida residential experience. The following section extensively details research findings and corresponding shifts in each of these areas. Transcendent themes, listed below, informed changes in multiple or all areas:

• Residents make no differentiation among internal HRE units; to them “Housing” is a singular entity.

• The frontline student position (RA) is clearly an important position to our residents as well as our staff.

DISCOVERY

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• Proximity and access are intertwined for our residents. Simply put, if something is difficult to get to or access, students don’t use it.

• Students are deeply impacted by a lack of standards demonstrated by their fellow residents, and this impacts their experience greatly. Issues around cleanliness, noise and conduct appear to stem from how residents interpret, accept responsibility for, and are held accountable to standards for living with other people.

• Consistency of vision is important for all levels of staff.

• The need to belong is paramount for all students.

• Students and families are overwhelmed by the number of decisions that need to be made at the University of Florida, beginning even before even arriving on campus. These decisions have a significant impact on the on-campus experience.

• Students assign value to their on-campus experience; while many indicated living on campus was “expensive,” they agree the nature of their experience dictates whether the cost is “worth it.”

• Families and students alike expect family members, particularly parents, to be involved in their students’ lives while they are in college, including their on-campus experience.

Students’ physiological, transition, and engagement needs drive the vision and implementation of the new University of Florida residential experience.

Transitions

One of the more significant themes that emerged from the research was the idea that the transition to college and life on campus begins well before the student ever matriculates at the University of Florida. As soon as the student expresses interest in applying to the University, the information stream begins – first as a trickle, and then as a flood. The timing of the housing application process to coincide with the admission process was frequently cited as very overwhelming for students and their parents. “I felt pressured and rushed to commit to housing and pay the deposit before I knew my final decision,” one of the research participants commented. (Traxler, Wills, & Connor, Metamorphosis Design Session Report, 2016) Another participant mentioned that she was “overwhelmed by the number of decisions [she] had to make every day.” Many of the participants indicated not knowing how to find out an answer to a basic question – the Housing website was difficult to navigate and calling the phone number resulted in a busy signal or a voice mail box.

The move-in experience generated strong feedback as well. Move-in occurred over several days, and although it was fairly organized, it did not feel like a signature, welcoming experience for students and their families. Many participants spoke highly of their experience with Preview, the summer first-year student orientation program, and expected that they would have the same level of service and energy when they arrived to move-in; when this did not occur, it left students and families feeling somewhat disappointed.

While exploring these themes, it became apparent that a new communication strategy for pre-arrival was needed, and that move-in should be reframed to be a culminating community event for the transitional phase that begins with the student applying to the University of Florida.

The new pre-arrival communication plan is comprised of several parts: a strong presence at Florida Days (an admissions event for students who are considering coming to the University of Florida); enhanced community information on the Housing website with an ability to refine and filter by area or building style; the creation and roll out of a series of “Family Chats,” including at least one prior to move-in; and an updated, enhanced experience for move-in day for all incoming students. Moreover, some adjustments were made to internal processes and workflows based on student

A NEW SIGNATURERESIDENTIAL EXPERIENCE

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and parent feedback. These included the purchase and deployment of a phone queueing system; a shift to allowing students to select building and room type rather than specific rooms; and moving room selection day away from weekday afternoons to a series of Saturdays. Taken together, this comprehensive strategy will allow students and their families to have information “just in time” for when it is needed, remove some of the frustrating information chokepoints, and help create a more welcoming experience for first-time residents.

First, the enhanced presence at Florida Days seemed like a natural way to start greeting prospective residents. Florida Days began in the spring of 2016 as a way for admitted-but-undecided students to take a closer look at the University of Florida. Admitted prospective students were invited to come to campus and learn more about the academic and non-academic parts of the University of Florida. Since the admission process and the housing application process run on parallel timelines, this seemed like an easy way to start the flow of information. In 2016, the Department of Housing had a table set up and coordinated some last minute tours of student rooms for students and families; in 2017, a more intentional approach included a formal presentation, hand-selected student rooms to tour, and better wayfinding information. In 2018, more tour locations and transportation were added.

Second, significant changes were recommended and eventually made to the Department of Housing’s website. In addition to a fresh look and easier navigational tools, a “community selector” was added based upon feedback gathered during the Metamorphosis Project. Students now have the ability to learn more about the variety of living options with filters for type of building, living learning community and location. Each residence hall’s information section includes photos, floor plans, and unique facts about the building, bus routes that serve the hall, a list of amenities, contact information for the front desk, and information about proximity to different academic units. During the summer of 2018, a project commenced to also include dimension information for typical rooms as well as for the furniture contained within the space; this information will be added to the website in the coming months.

Another developed successful concept are the “Family Chats.” Based on a series of successful question-and-answer sessions hosted online by the Dean of Students Office, these Family Chats invite parents and families of on-campus students to ask questions of Housing staff with a topical focus. The first one that families are invited to participate in happens before move-in and is focused around the process and emotions of moving a student into the residence halls. Nearly 120 students and families participated in the first move-in family chat.

Although move-in had long been a successful process at the University of Florida, the Metamorphosis project forced a reframing of move-in day from a process a student endures to a signature experience welcoming students and their families to housing. Creating a signature experience meant having a clear beginning, middle and end to the process and having more of an emphasis on the celebratory and transitional nature of the day rather than the logistics. First, the department shifted to a first-year student move in day being separate and apart from returning students. This shift meant a few big changes: staff more appropriately to provide quick service and a celebratory environment, hold first floor meetings all at the same time as a transitional event for first-year students, and organize a new student and family welcome and ice cream social with the help of colleagues in the Dean of Students’ Office. This experience was treated like a warm hand-off from the team who recruited, admitted and oriented students and their families to the team who

would support the students all year long as they lived in the halls. The first attempt at this event was wildly successful, with more than 1500 students and families participating. One area for future consideration related to move in, however, was to provide more detailed instructions or a step-by-step guide on how to move-in.

While not concepts developed formally through the Metamorphosis Project work group, the assignments team made several changes based on real student feedback and frustration that have contributed to a more positive student experience. For several years, residents have been able to self-select into rooms or buildings at the University of Florida based on date of application for housing. While the ability to customize their experience was important to students, this often left operational challenges when rooms would only partially fill: roommate pairs would find no availability, and those choosing rooms later would be frustrated with buildings that appeared to be full. Instead, residents are now able to select a building and room type, and are assigned a particular room at a later date. This allows the assignments team to control vacancies with more precision, and allows more students to be able to select communities that will work well for them while alleviating much of the frustration of availability.

An additional change made by the assignments team was to move room selection dates from weekdays to Saturdays. The weekdays were originally chosen because they were easy for the assignments team; feedback from residents and parents, however, showed that this caused a lot of stress for them. Driven by the fear of being “shut out” of certain buildings or rooms, some students even admitted to leaving high school classes early on their appointed day so that they could make their selection at the proper time. Shifting selection to a series of Saturdays has lessened the stress for room selection for students considerably; members of the assignments team recognize that this makes for an overall better process, and do not mind working a series of weekend shifts to help students have a more positive experience.

Finally, one of the significant points of negative feedback from residents and parents had to do with the amount of time and effort it took to get help when calling the front desk of the housing office. Students or parents would often reach a voicemail box instead of a live person during peak periods, and it could take several days for them to get a call back. Additionally, if a caller was transferred to a specific person and got that person’s voicemail, the caller would have to hang up and call back again. In 2017, a new phone call queuing software was debuted. Now, a caller is routed into a call queue and the next available person who is answering calls will pick up the phone. Callers are told about their place in the queue and call information is available on a computer dashboard for housing staff. This has decreased wait times dramatically and few callers who call during business hours end up being routed to voicemail. In essence, a simple product purchase has improved the experience of students and parents; in turn, students and parents are able to get information they need more quickly, which lessens the stress of decision-making before arrival to campus.

Physiological Needs

Published in 1943, Abraham Maslow’s “A Theory of Human Motivation” has long been referenced by student affairs professionals as behavioral theory with a profound effect on the field; indeed, the student development paradigm emerged during a period that was heavily influenced by a growing body of psychological and sociological theories which emphasized the unique needs of the individual. Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs,” in brief, describes the patterns of behavior that humans

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move through as driven by their motivation (Maslow, 1943). The foundation of Maslow’s hierarchy is the motivation for meeting physiological needs – such as food, sleep and shelter; this is followed closely by the need for a sense of safety. The base of the pyramid represents the most important, basic human needs, which must be met first.

One of the more interesting aspects of the Metamorphosis Project research was that it confirmed, through the real lived experiences of its participants, the important role that university housing can play in meeting the physiological and safety needs of residents.

One of the primary ways that the Department of Housing meets the safety needs of residents is by ensuring life-safety systems are up-to-date and that staff and students are trained in their use. Although fire safety has been promoted for years, a rebranding of the initial fire safety compliance walkthroughs would allow residence life staff to focus more on education rather than discipline. Additionally, non-fire-safety related items were added to the list of things that staff could check for, including improper furniture configuration, the pet policy, and hooks on the back of the room doors. Behind all of the changes to rebranding was a push for more consistent, centralized training on fire safety issues, which was implemented fully for Summer B 2018.

For many students, access to high speed, reliable, pervasive internet has become a fundamental need. As technology has become ever-present, students rely on internet connections to do classwork, watch lectures, and talk with family and keep up with friends both on- and off-campus. Residents are, on average, connecting to the internet with three different devices, and one of the tasks they complete upon moving into the residence hall is to set up their Wi-Fi connection. Despite a wired internet port being available for every student, Skyfactor data from 2016 showed an overall decrease in satisfaction with respect to internet access; already one of the lower scoring items in 2014, the satisfaction rating for “internet connectivity in your room” dropped again in 2016 (Skyfactor Program Assessments, 2016). Additionally, internet access was one of the most-cited items in the Metamorphosis research. In the fall of 2017, a wireless upgrade project was completed; this project consisted of installing one wireless access point (WAP) for every two residence hall rooms across campus. Over the course of five months, every residence hall received the upgrade and more consistent wireless signal is now available for residents.

Technology has changed other areas of life as well, especially in the way students shop. Over the past two years, the number of packages received by residents at the University of Florida has increased exponentially. At the same time, the number of hours that the service desks in the residence halls are open have decreased, with most desks now closing at 8 pm during the week and earlier on the weekends. The service desks have long been the place where residents would go to pick up packages; if a package was delivered but the resident was unable to retrieve it before the desk closed for the day, there was no way for a student to get the item they were expecting. Many students, particularly those in some of the medical fields like nursing, do not return to the residence halls for the evening until after the service desks closed; this mismatch of expectation and service became a point of genuine frustration for students, families and even staff. To address this problem, automated package lockers were purchased for each residence hall and a new department – Housing Package Services – was created to track, deliver and troubleshoot resident packages. The automated package lockers send residents a code when a package is placed in the lockers; residents then come to the locker, punch in their code, and retrieve their packages.

Students can retrieve packages at any time of day or night, for up to three days after the package has been delivered. In the first month of operation, approximately 15% of packages were retrieved during hours when the service desks were closed. Additionally, the creation of the Housing Package Services unit gives students one point of contact for any delivery-related issues or concerns.

Another common theme in the Metamorphosis research was that students tended to feel most let down or disappointed when their expectations and experience were not in alignment. Several of the concepts for addressing physiological needs were aimed at attempting to align the two; the common denominator tended to be communication – what information was communicated, how was it communicated and when was it communication? One specific example was the lockout policy. Students get a certain number of “free” lockouts per semester before they face a potential fee or other consequence; the feedback indicated that this policy was widely misunderstood and inconsistently communicated. Previously, this information was sometimes discussed at floor meetings, or potentially in individual conversations with residents, but there was not a large scale process for reminding residents of the policy. A small ¼-size sheet was created, in the updated Housing marketing style, to spell out the policy for students. This sheet was provided to staff to hand out along with temporary keys or when performing a lock-out. Additionally, the policy was written into the expectations for the first floor meeting agenda that the student staff conduct on the first night the residents live on campus. Another example of improving communication to help match expectations and experience was the creation of an updated packing list to go on the Housing website. The packing list included a reference to the community standards, and designated which items were subject to restrictions based upon the same set of standards. A third example was the creation of an information placard with important phone numbers to be placed on the back of student room doors. This initiative was piloted in three locations and feedback was collected from students in the pilot locations. Thirty-three percent of the students in the pilot locations indicated that they used information on the placard at least one time, and more than 50% said that the information provided was helpful (Moyna, 2017).

Several concepts to address the physiological and safety needs of residents are in need of further development. First, an update to the Roommate Conflict Resolution process should be considered. This concept includes providing an electronic early individual assessment for each resident to bring a completed copy of roommate agreement to a meeting, mandating the use of the roommate agreement consistently across campus and providing a structured process that is more consistent and yet effective for each community. Staff in the halls consistently report that roommate conflicts can be the hardest and most time-consuming part of the job (Traxler, Wills, & Connor, University of Florida Metamorphosis Project Research Document, 2016); developing this concept further will

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allow staff to feel supported in conflict situations, which allows them to better address student needs and feel engaged in their peer helper role.

Another concept for further development is the creation of a full-time staff position specializing in conflict resolution as well as a full-time case manager. These roles have been filled, in part, by the addition of a full-time assistant director in the Conduct & Conflict Resolution office; the newly-hired position is responsible for many of the care- and crisis-related matters that come through that office. Many residents and RAs have little to no experience in addressing conflicts, and therefore do not possess the skills to start the conversation, let alone be able to resolve it. Campuses often make assumptions that residents understand the differences between a request, a confrontation and a threat. For residents not used to conflict, a simple request to take out the trash can seem threatening even though the intent was a request. Proactive education with opportunities for skill-building are needed to allow residents to address conflicts on their own without staff intervention. A more purposeful program for conflict resolution is needed to provide an effective intervention process for conflicts and a proactive educational curriculum for dealing with conflicts. The work on intervention strategies has been a part of the crisis and confrontation models for decades and similar programs can be found at most institutions. The proactive strategies for conflict have been nonexistent. Specifically, some areas of need are: helping students deal with online bullying, social media etiquette, and digital civility; helping residents understand healthy boundaries, and helping residents identify and communication personal needs and preferences with fellow residents. Additionally, a case manager would be able to serve as a primary contact for students experiencing varying degrees of need and /or distress in the residence halls. To start a more inclusive, complex conflict resolution program, and provide for ongoing support for students in distress, resources need to be allocated.

One of the most-cited themes from the research had to do with cleanliness, both perceived cleanliness of the residence halls and lack of skill by residents to keep spaces clean. Two concepts have been identified for further development: the roll out of a rubric for acceptable move-in readiness for rooms, and supplying a limited number of cleaning supplies for community use.

One of the most fulfilling and uplifting parts of the research indicated that residents on campus truly view the RA as a valuable peer-to-peer resource; in fact, the RA could be seen as being the single most impactful influence on the residential experience. According to Skyfactor data collected in 2016, residential students consistently rated their satisfaction with hall student staff as “excellent,” with a mean rating of 5.77 on a 7-point scale; this rating ranked above the institutional goal and a slight increase from 2014. Additionally, student staff in the hall were ranked very highly on “helping with a problem,” “treating everyone fairly,” and “promoting tolerance of others (Skyfactor Program Assessments, 2016).” The metamorphosis research indicated that residents view their RA as a resource, particularly if the RA has been friendly and open from the beginning. Additionally, student referenced turning to peers (including the RA) for help before turning to any other person on campus; one person even referred to his RA as a “friend and guide,” while another stated “My RA makes me feel that the residence hall is a friendly place to be.” Even when the RA-resident relationship was not good, it was easy to see the impact on the relationship. One research participant described a very difficult relationship with her RA, stating that her RA “gave her dirty looks” and “I don’t feel comfortable around the RA and will not go to her for help (Traxler, Wills, & Connor, University of Florida Metamorphosis Project Research Document, 2016).” However, this

same student recognized that the staff in the building was a resource, and discussed that she “felt glad that she made friends with her previous RA and that we would study together; she even taught me how to use the bus [locator] app.” This student specifically called out the impact that the staff had on her, both positive and negative.

Engagement

The Residential Experience and Learning Model (REALM) is the overarching framework for our new approach to facilitating engagement. The REALM is a curricular approach to learning and engagement in the residence halls.

What is a Residential Curriculum?

A residential curriculum is a next practice in higher education being adopted by more and more progressive universities nationwide (Roompact, 2017). Residential curriculums are structured approaches to learning that are rooted in assessment. They are based around the theory of essentialism, or the mindset that focuses on what is central to mission and ignores external noise (McKeown, 2014). A true residential curriculum is connected to the institutional mission and provides direct learning goals and outcomes. A residential curriculum provides scaffolded learning for students that is ordered and thoughtful. There are several benefits to implementing a Residential Curriculum model, as evidenced by our mission.

• A residential curriculum provides opportunities that are closely tied to the institutional and divisional mission. From our initial research for the Metamorphosis Project, a thought leader shared, “If we don’t get closer to the mission of the institution we will be extinct as an operation.” A residential curriculum would tie our community-building and educational initiatives to the institutional mission.

• A residential curriculum ensures that student staff are utilized in roles appropriate to their skill development. According to Lee Upcraft (2014), “the research is very clear and consistent: traditional students are most worried about (1) succeeding academically and (2) finding friends, a peer network that provides support...I believe we have overloaded the RA job with all kinds of expectations that are not very realistic, given that most RAs are undergraduates studying full time. We should have RAs concentrate on building floor involvement and helping individual students succeed. We should not expect them to be diversity experts, career development experts, alcohol/other drug experts, sexuality experts, etc. Those issues are best handled by involvement of or referral to professionals inside or outside the academic community. The RA role should be student relationship based, and we should stop demanding that they be all purpose experts on every new developmental issue that comes down the road. Stick to the basics: the relationship of the RA to his or her students, and the development of a positive floor climate.”

• In a residential curriculum, educational strategies are more than simply programs. One thought leader explained, “The whole curriculum hasn’t changed fundamentally since I went to grad school in 1980 around student development, the history of higher ed and what it means to program...So how we’ve done programming has to fundamentally change and when you think about that and what becomes the role of the RA?”

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• Intentionality is critical to student success. According to one thought leader, “I’ve been doing at least 2 reviews on campuses the last 4 years, and what I hear from student staff is they’re doing the programming just to do the programming. Checking the box. Students aren’t coming so why are we doing it? Are we doing it because we believe in the past it was important? Or is it a good use of the resource and use of their time? I think the RAs would be doing something differently - I think we would have much more of an integrated curriculum.”

• In addition to building community and educating residents, the impacts could be far-reaching. At the University of Central Florida, a neighboring institution, the implementation of a residential curriculum model resulted in a 20.7% decrease in incident reports submitted over the course of one academic year.

Generation Z

Scholarship on Generation Z establishes that this group values and seeks out alone time to disconnect and decompress. Additionally, they are multitaskers who prefer short and concise messaging to meet their short attention span.

This creates the need for a fundamental shift in how residence hall environments, and specifically programming, have been designed to work. The residence hall community is now competing for smaller amounts of available time. As anthropologist Rebekah Nathan described in her book My Freshman Year: What a Professor Learned by Becoming a Student (Cornell University Press, 2005), “20 years ago…10 years ago…the focus was housing as a cornerstone and anchor of community. Class schedules were similar for students, they ate daily dinner together, and mostly, they had little to no connection to home. That’s very different from what we see today.”

Accordingly, a team of students, RLE staff, and an external curricular expert form the REALM committee. This team’s first task was to develop an overarching Learning Priority, educational goals, and specific learning outcomes for each residential student at the University of Florida. In addition to Metamorphosis research, this framework was informed by Baxter Magolda’s Theory of Self-Authorship, Boyer’s Six Principles of Community, the mission of the Department of Housing and Residence Education and the vision for the Division of Student Affairs, and the academic mission of the University of Florida.

Figure 1: Residential Experience and Learning Model Framework

O UR R E AL M L E AR N I NG P R IOR IT Y I S FOR STUDENTS TO L IVE, LE ARN , AN D LE AD I N TH E RESI DENCE HAL LS I N AL IGN M ENT WITH TH E UN IVERSIT Y M I SSION AN D OUR F LORI DA

FIVE EDUC ATIONAL G OALS, S O THAT TH EY C AN P OSITIVELY I M PACT TH EI R COM MUN ITI ES,TH E GATOR NATION , AN D WORL D.

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Strategies

Community Conversations

In Metamorphosis Project research, RAs at each stage indicated they were most satisfied around areas related to building relationships with residents. They appeared to be least satisfied around administrative duties, developing programs, and encouraging residents to attend programs. One RA articulated this difficulty by sharing that he put a lot of intention, thought, and effort into planning four events and marketing them, only to have no one attend. Data that the Lakeside/Springs community collected from their programmatic efforts reflected this challenge, as well. Individual floor programs received very little turnout, while large-scale events and partnerships with the Gatorwell office were generally better attended.

As an RA explained, “The greatest difficulty I face in my programming which is getting residents to be friends with other residents in different rooms because they’re shy and it’s really hard to break down those barriers and make people be friends so that is definitely the biggest obstacle is just getting residents to come to programs.”

The evolution of the RA position has led to an increase in the number of roles an RA must fill, while also making it more difficult for them to perform optimally in any one of their roles. “Not only have new roles been added, but long standing roles have become more complex.” (Buhrow, 1991).

In the REALM, the role of the RA shifts to focus on intentional relationships with residents. Scholarship on the success of college students highlights the importance of personal relationships and interactions (Astin, 1993), connections (Gallup-Perdue, 2016 and Kuh, 2005), and intentionality (Blimling, 2015). Detailed lesson plans for each meeting to serve as a framework for the conversation.

• They contain a balance of community development, engaging activities, learning, and reflection.

• Community Conversations are be 30-45 minutes long, and take place on the floor whenever possible.

• Impact of Community Meetings at the University of Central Florida:

• 75.2% of students who attended the October community meeting could articulate how the stories of others impacted their understanding of identity.

• 74.9% of residents could articulate at least one way that the activity broadened their world view.

• 90.5% of residents at April community meetings could articulate how they positively impacted the community this year.

• Please see appendix A for an example of a Community Conversation lesson plan.

• Chomp Chats

• These are one-on-one conversations that happen twice a semester between the RA and the resident, covering provided topics depending on the time of year.

• Impact of Chomp Chats at UCF (called Knight to Knights or K2Ks):

• 78.9% of students who participated in the first K2K, which focused on roommate relations, could articulate strategies for managing conflict.

• 89.9% of residents could articulate why it is important to have an inclusive community during the February K2K.

• 74.1% of residents who participated in the closing K2K were able to articulate how their values/beliefs have changed or been reinforced this year.

Embedded and Campus Partnerships

Another substantial indication of the Metamorphosis data and emerging scholarship on generation Z was the need for meaningful and individualized attention. Students spend much of their day in class; their willingness and interest in returning to the residence hall and participating in an hour long workshop was low. What developed was a model of diversified support from key campus experts, with an increased emphasis on 1:1 interventions.

With this new approach to resource embedding, the concept for four pilot unoffices emerged. In residential areas with high traffic spaces (Broward, Graham, Jennings, and Murphree), lean desks resembling hotel concierge kiosks were built. Key academic, Student Affairs, and community partners spend time at the unoffices, creating opportunities for brief and individualized interventions with residential students.

Academic and career advising were among the most pressing needs of our residential students. Serving a primarily first year population, the need to meaningfully explore issues of passion, purpose, and major and career alignment early was critical. In the Fall of 2017 we hired two embedded career liaisons. They provide 1:1 career coaching appointments, drop in hours, a six week Career Success Institute seminar, additional training to RAs and student leaders, and more, all within the residence hall environment. In each of their first two terms, these residential career liaisons have connected with, coached, and mentored about 1800 residential students per semester.

Our career liaisons also serve as key partners to our academic stakeholders for living-learning communities, and provide tailored initiatives for each of our 16 residentially-based learning communities. They partner with our academic stakeholders as well as employers to provide experiential learning opportunities like suture clinics in the Pre-Health Living Learning community right where our students live. Our embedded career coaches also partner with three academic advisors-in-residence, who provide critical group and individual advising several times per week, and equip 15 RCCs to serve as embedded peer advisors in each residential area.

Finally, a counselor-in-residence rounds out our embedded team. With a residence hall office and priority access for residential students, our counselor works 40 hours each week and provides full counseling services in the residence hall. Residents are able to see a counselor sooner than other UF students, and in a more convenient location. Our counselor-in-residence also provides support and training to our residence hall staff at all levels, and they and our other embedded liaisons are equipped to refer students to our counselor-in-residence.

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Partnering with the UF Teaching Center to contract for residential tutoring and exam reviews for key courses among our students represents another powerful academic partnership in our REALM. A formula to identify high impact classes for weekly tutoring and exam reviews considers courses with the highest rates of enrollment, withdraws, grades of C or below, and academic integrity issues among our residential students. Twelve hours per week of tutoring for four courses and exam reviews at key intervals attracted over 600 students in the first six weeks of implementation.

Signature Events

Metamorphosis data from various channels pointed to the need for signature, traditional events: residents pointed out inconsistencies in the residential experience based on living in different areas, and shared a willingness to leave their area or campus for a shared experience; RAs noted a lack of capacity at their level for creating large scale programming; and our vice president for student affairs called for a “signature UF student experience.” As a result, Signature Events were developed as a key component of the REALM. A team led by two Master’s-prepared coordinators plan and implement five “signature” events each year, while the inter-Residence Hall Association (IRHA) of student leaders and their adviser, also take responsibility for two Signature Events (one in Fall, one in Spring.) These events are grounded in the Florida Five framework for the REALM, and create an opportunity for the entire residential population to come together and experience an event together.

Student Leadership

As the role of the RCC shifts to focus on individual interactions and meaningful engagement with residents on their floor, large scale programs and events in individual areas emerge as the primary task for area governments. Key leadership skills are developed through the planning, execution, and assessment of these social programs. A competency-based subcurriculum of for those serving on our 13 area governments, Staff Advisory Board, National Residence Hall Honorary, and inter-Residence Hall Association empowers those students to take a deeper dive into leadership right where they live.

Figure 2: Student Leader Competencies and Learning Outcomes

Communication: students will be able to interpret and convey verbal and nonverbal messages in diverse situations

Formulate written correspondences with peers, faculty, and staff

Demonstrate active listening skills in by maintaining eye contact or taking notes

Reflect on information gathered at meetings in one on ones and reporting back

Critical Thinking: Students will be able to analyze complex situations and distinguish possible outcomes and impacts

Identify 3 resources in the residence halls to turn to for help

Apply knowledge of fiscal responsibility to organization purchasing and budgeting

Recognize risks and challenges of events, meetings, and budgetary decisions

Social Responsibility: Students will examine their role as part of a larger community

Practice taking responsibility for one’s actions and their outcomes

Articulate personal definition of diversity and inclusion

Provide a personal definition of community and see its connection to a sense of belonging

Teamwork: Students will identify organizational goals, individual strengths, roles on a team

Recognize the mission of their organization

Be able to articulate the role they play on the team

Set one personal, positional, and academic goal

Practice interpersonal skills in meeting and one on one settings

Sense of Self: Students will develop knowledge of personal identities and build confidence

Recognize their own diverse identities

Apply personal values to practice ethical leadership

Practice receiving and providing effective feedback

Be able to identify their own personal strengths

Passive Strategies

We recognize that there exists an abundance of high quality opportunities for students’ learning and development at the University of Florida, and that our residents have a finite capacity to engage outside their academic commitments. It is not the job of Residence Life and Education to compete with other excellent UF initiatives, or contribute to an oversaturation of workshops, events, lectures, or organizations on our campus. With this in mind, our REALM facilitates passive approaches to residential engagement; with examples including a group walk over to a campus speaker or event, an interactive bulletin board, or an impromptu movie night in the lounge.

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Organizational Structure

One thing that quickly became evident during the research was the need to evolve the staffing structure; our students quickly told us that they considered the relationship with their RA to be one of the more critical relationships developed during the on-campus experience. If the student-RA relationship seemed to be at the center of the student experience, we needed to adapt our organization in such a way that the main focus of the position was to develop and enhance those relationships. The staff structure and position responsibilities were the last piece of the Metamorphosis puzzle to fall in to place.

In addition to the research with our students, it was important to also gather input from current student staff. Two members of the senior leadership staff held a series of listening tours during the Spring of 2018, with one session geared towards different groups of student staff: RAs in apartment-style facilities, RAs in traditional residence halls, and those RAs who were currently in their third or fourth year serving in their positions. Several themes emerged, including the need to clarify expectations for the role campus-wide, to provide more training on certain topics (particularly those centered around the transition to on-campus living), and a need to put critical job-related information in a consistent and easily-accessible place. The most frequently-cited assertion, however, was the feeling of needing to fulfill so many responsibilities; if the RA is expected to be both the disciplinarian and the resource as well as the event planner and the entertainer, how would it be possible to expect that RAs were meeting both the needs of the residents and the expectations of the department? The RAs told us that their most important role – the one that helped the students most, as well as provided the greatest sense of fulfillments – was to make students feel welcomed and that they belonged in the community.

In order to re-focus the RA position on community belonging, it was necessary to shift or let go of a number of traditional RA responsibilities. Some, for example, managing purchasing logistics for floor supplies or activities, were bumped up to the supervisory (graduate staff) level. Other responsibilities, like developing content for events, were shifted to other parts of Residence Life and Education, namely Student Learning & Engagement and the REALM Steering Committee; the conduct area expanded in both graduate and professional staff to be able to take on more of the student discipline load. Still others, such as administrative desk hours, were abandoned entirely. Staff training prior to the semester changed as well; instead of trying to train everyone on everything they might need to know in a limited period of time, the focus changed to “just-in-

time” training with a model for ongoing training after the semester began. Additionally, we shifted some RA positions around and added a few more positions to achieve a slightly lower student-to-resident ratio or 1:35, and made a change to how we hired our staff to ensure that all areas had an equitable number of new and returning staff members. Finally, we utilized one of the common eLearning platforms (Canvas) at the University of Florida as a place to maintain information, track the completion of certain items, and give staff members a way to access critical information at all hours of the day in a format that was already familiar to them.

A new emphasis on the student experience heralded a name change for our positions as well. We believed it to be critical that the title of the position would align with the focus and job duties; as of Fall 2019, our undergraduate student staff positions will no longer be Resident Assistants, but Resident Community Coordinators.

Necessarily, we modified our graduate and professional staff positions and structure as well; the changes at these levels were sometimes a bit smaller or more subtle, but were designed to re-align position expectations with the true needs of our students. Responsibility for the curriculum design, partnerships with outside entities, and overall learning now lies solely with Student Learning and Engagement, while our experts in Conduct and Community Standards proactively and reactively manage all facets of student care and discipline. Recognizing that a critical partnership in the residence hall was between residence life staff and those that work at the service desks in the halls, the Area Desk operations moved under Residence Life. Finally, we followed suit in a name change for graduate level staff, and have re-branded those positions as Graduate Community Coordinators. Overall, while we adjusted levels, placement and responsibilities of our staff, the net addition of staff was relatively minimal. We consider the slight additional personnel budget expense to be a minimal investment in the higher-quality experience we will provide for our residents.

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Assessment

Just as a substantive and multi-pronged evaluation of our organization, students, and families guided the Metamorphosis project, a commitment to comprehensive and mixed method assessment strategy ensures our capacity to be nimble, adaptive, and effective as we continuously meet the evolving needs of our stakeholders. While some aspects of this approach will be illuminated as we move into the future, some are clear now.

Analyses of existing data including call and email logs, fob access, and work order requests and others have both formative and summative potential; we will leverage this data to understand how our programmatic shifts impact our stakeholders and what areas for growth emerge as we move into the future. A critical aspect to residential curriculum assessment is measurement of learning outcome achievement, captured via survey instruments at key milestones and cornerstone events. Participation in the ACUHO-I endorsed Skyfactor survey instrument will allow our organization to stay abreast of our students’ experience and benchmark against peer institutions across a wide-ranging and inclusive group of factors defining the on campus experience. Local focus groups and individual exit interviews will provide greater depth into our understanding the overall residential experience.

Other components of assessment to inform our cycle of continuous improvement will be identified as we move into this next chapter of Housing and Residence Education. A key lesson from this Metamorphosis Project is that we cannot write in stone now the philosophy, approach, or formula for success in even the very near future. Our commitment to being uniquely attuned, deft, and agile extends to how we will continue to measure and test our processes, programs, and practices.

Enduring Organizational Changes

The Department of Housing & Residence Education at the University of Florida has been through a period of significant change over the past three years. One of the most profound changes has been cultural; in a span of three years, the Department has moved from a traditional-thinking, reactionary unit to one that embraces change and innovation. This was not a simple or swift change. The beginning stages of the project were met with serious resistance from full-time staff members in housing; for many, the fear of potential position or responsibility changes outweighed the ability to be innovative and best serve students. Furthermore, concern about the ability to buy-in to a new philosophical direction lead to several staff departures in the first months of the project.

In the excitement of the possibilities of what could be, one of the core tenets of leading change got lost: people tend to love change, but they hate being told how change will happen and being expected to implement. Several steps into the project, it became apparent that there was a need to return to the beginning and bring in all layers of staff; furthermore, it was not enough to just allow staff into the conversation, but it became imperative to rely on their practical expertise and incorporate their ideas. Although it slowed down the timeline considerably, this step was critical to the success of the project.

The other cultural shift that occurred in the department is that the design thinking process has now been ingrained. Before this project, change and new ideas were encouraged; now, they are expected. It is understood that changes will continue to be made to new concepts and initiatives as the feedback from students and families changes; it also understood that not every new initiative will be a roaring success. In this vein, there are several concepts that were considered as a part of the project, but were tabled for a variety of reasons. These concepts can continue to be discussed and developed as warranted. For example, one of the ideas generated revolved around a formalized proactive program helping students and staff address suicidal ideation and self-injurious behavior, but was tabled until a counselor-in-residence was brought on-board. Now that the counselor-in-residence position has been formalized, this concept can be revisited. Other concepts for future consideration include: interactive cooking classes for residence hall students, cleaning supplies provided in residence hall lounges, and the creation of a conflict coordinator staff position designed to work specifically with roommates.

Concluding Thoughts

Two overarching lessons carry us into this next season of Residence Life and Education. The design thinking process as a framework for this process provided key learning opportunities, and this approach has permeated our very organizational culture. The capacity to consider “what could be?” without limitation represents a fundamental shift in our department. We reject operating within what has always been or even what our peer institutions have identified as good practice. Our organization has committed to looking at our own students, families, and staff, and endeavoring to discover, create, write, and rewrite the approaches that will do the greatest good for them.

Finally, this project began as the Residence Life and Education Metamorphosis Project, but we quickly identified that for our residents and their family members there is no Residence Life, no Facilities, no Housing Operations or Building Services. For them, there is only Housing; and it is essential that we as an organization function as such. Resultantly, siloes have been dismantled, communication has been broadened, and staff have rolled up their sleeves to do the work of Housing in an unprecedented way.

As we look to the future, we celebrate that we have assembled a team committed to truly listening to and understanding our stakeholders, particularly our students; to leaning into innovation, risk, and change; and who embrace our new organizational philosophy: “One Team, One Goal, One Housing.”

LOOKI NG FORWARD


SOURCESAstin, Alexander W. What matters in college. Vol. 9. San Francisco: Jossey-bass, 1993.

Blimling, G.(2015). Student learning in college residence halls: What works, what doesn’t, and why.

Brown, P. G. (2016). College student development in digital spaces. New Directions for Student Services, 2016(155), 59-73.

Carroll, J. L., & Buhrow, M. (1994). Concurrent validity of the Culture-Free Self-Esteem Inventory and physical health in college students. Psychological reports, 74(2), 553-554.

Elmore, T. (2015). A Generation of Paradox.

Kuh, G. D. (2005). Student engagement in the first year of college. Challenging and supporting the first-year student: A handbook for improving the first year of college, 86-107.

Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological review, 50(4), 370.

Upcraft, M. L., Gardner, J. N., & Barefoot, B. O. (2005). Challenging and supporting the first-year student: A handbook for improving the first year of college (Vol. 254). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

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