News
By Christina Drake | Newsreporter
The first-ever JCU Residence Assistant (RA) Representative has been appointed to the Student Senate this Fall semester. Senior student Kayla Muller is the RA to fill the new representative role.
“The intent of the position is to give the RAs a voice,” said Muller.
The JCU Student Senate currently has eight representatives speaking for different JCU academic departments. This semester, the RA Representative is the exception by becoming the ninth voice to speak from the position of a staff-student.
According to Muller, having an RA representative in Student Senate helps streamline a more direct communication between RAs and JCU President Franco Pavoncello. In the past, communication between the Housing Office and other Student Affairs offices has made it complicated to bring information forward from the RAs.
Residence Director of the Gianicolo Apartments, Melisa Olier Pedroza, said she supports this new channel of communication, since now the RAs can bring their concerns to the Student Government, while the rest of the Housing Office brings theirs to supervisors.
“[RAs are] part of the JCU staff until a certain point, but they’re also students,” said Olier Pedroza.
Creating the Position
The idea to represent RAs in the senate originated within Student Government.
Since the Student Senate’s creation last year, “[representing RAs] is something that we hadn’t thought of, and it’s useful,” said Professor Alessandra Grego, Senate Faculty Advisor and Chair of the JCU English Department.
Student Government President, Sebastian Terrazas, and Chief of Staff, Gavin Beckett, said they have lived in JCU housing before but only learned how much RAs do when they befriended one. The RA Senate Representative position comes as a welcome addition to everyone who knows how hard RAs work, they said.
Student Government Events Coordinator, senior Michaela Murphy, says she is aware of the intensity of an RA’s job, having worked as an RA for the past two semesters.
“As student leaders, we should have a voice with the student population, outside of the students we oversee,” said Murphy. “The intention of creating the position was to give us that representation that we’ve never had.”
After President Terrazas supported the proposal, the search for the new RA representative began.
Representatives are usually elected by students, but because this semester’s elections had already concluded, RA Manager Vanessa Di Carlo was asked to recommend candidates instead.
Muller was appointed for her professionalism, teamwork and her experience as an RA in past semesters.
“She also has great maturity,” said Di Carlo. “She would be able to bring the needs of this population to student government in a very effective manner.”
As the first ever RA representative, Muller said she wants to shape the position into exactly what the other RAs want it to be. She said she acknowledges the pressure that comes with establishing something new but is pleased to communicate her co-workers’ needs independently.
“More so than pressure, I think it’s very empowering,” said Muller.
Resident Assistants at JCU
The university employs 15 to 20 students as RAs each semester who act as mentors, supporters, and friends to every student in their assigned JCU residence building.
“Their presence is important for residents to feel safe and feel like they have someone to go to if anything happens,” said Olier Pedroza.
Before students move in, RAs do a series of trainings to prepare for the Student Orientation Program.
Once residents arrive, members of the RA team remain on-call around the clock to help students with various issues regarding accommodation, from lost apartment keys and challenges adjusting to Rome to safety and health emergencies.
“They pretty much have to be ready for anything that could happen in the residences,” said RA Manager Di Carlo. “That requires a lot of energy and mental space.”
Di Carlo and Olier Pedroza work closely with the RAs in JCU’s Housing Office and have nothing but compliments for their work ethic.
“I absolutely trust each one of them,” Olier Pedroza said. “All of them are very professional and they’re always on top of their tasks.”
“Close-Knit” RAs
RAs participate in training together, attend weekly meetings together, and those assigned to the same residence building even room together. This makes for an amazing teamwork in the “close-knit” RA community, says Muller. It also means that the representative has the challenge of balancing relationships with the other RAs as friends, co-workers, and, in her case, acting as a reference and spokesperson.
According to Muller, it might not immediately occur to other RAs that she can communicate their needs as they arise. In the minds of the other RAs, she is a peer and a friend, she says.
“I’m somebody who can understand, but people may not see me as somebody that they can go to, to fix the problem,” says Muller.
“Without the RAs, Housing and Residential life would not function,” said Di Carlo, “They truly are the backbone of the residential life.”
According to Di Carlo, this semester’s RA group has exceptionally good chemistry, making for a perfect team to tackle their many responsibilities.
“It’s been a really great experience this particular year,” she said.
The RA Rep Differs from Academic Reps
According to Muller, the Senate representation has proven helpful, although the position is still a work in progress. She says the role is still experiencing some “growing pains,” because “a lot of change is happening, and it can make communication a little bit difficult sometimes.”
One challenge has been collecting feedback from other RAs.
Senate Representatives distribute anonymous surveys to their academic departments, asking about class sizes, professors, and required courses for majors, according to Professor Grego. Much of the Senate’s meeting time is devoted to creating these surveys and reviewing the responses.
Muller says that since being an RA is a job and not a field of study, the school-centric prompts are not as applicable, so other types of questions have to be created. Her RA surveys collect feedback on job training, work environment, and RA safety.
The RAs have a “united stance” on most fronts and the surveys help get things in writing, says Muller.
All surveys are anonymous, but the sensitive subject matters and the small RA community require extra care to ensure confidentiality. To do this, Terrazas and Student Government VP, Harman Singh, have met with Muller individually.
According to Terrazas, this close working relationship is unusual because it puts students together from two sides of Student Government that do not typically mix: the Senate and the Cabinet.
Cabinet vs. Senate: What’s the Difference?
The Cabinet includes students elected to the positions of President, Vice President, Events Coordinator, Chief of Staff, Student Policy Advisor, Secretary, and Social Media Manager. They work to improve the overall JCU student experience beyond the constraints of one department. They collect information from students and professors and review the feedback from the Senate’s surveys.
The Senate includes students elected to represent JCU’s academic departments and one representing RAs. These senators focus on improving their specific department’s student experience. They collect feedback through student surveys and face-to-face interactions.
The Senate was created last fall with its student leaders taking their seats for the first time.
“Last year, the senate only really existed in name but had no defined responsibilities or organization,” said Terrazas.
Beckett was the Political Science and International Affairs Representative during the Senate’s first year.
“I wasn’t sure how to do it to my best capabilities because no one else had done it before,” said Beckett. “So there’s no one for me to look back on.”
Many Student Government members agree that this year the Senate is running more smoothly, returning Senators now have practice, and the new ones have guidelines to follow.
Representatives also said they noticed improved communication between the Cabinet and Senate this year, thanks to Beckett acting as a liaison. This fall, he began attending both Cabinet and Senate meetings, leading Senate discussions and bringing their findings to the Cabinet.
Professor Grego said she noticed improvement in the group’s organization and discussions. She said she is pleased that the Senate is becoming a place where new communities like the RAs want to participate in.
“I hope that that will leave a kind of legacy,” said Grego. “And then there will be a new generation of senators.”
Student Government runs tables on the Guarini and Frohring campuses every other Monday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Students are encouraged to talk to a member of the Government or put anonymous feedback in the suggestion box.
According to Professor Grego, the Student Government being there in person shows to the student community that they have representation, and “helps them to get a feeling that they also have authority and also have to take responsibility.”
Feature image: Student Government’s anonymous suggestion box on a table at Guarini Campus. Photo by Christina Drake.
Suggested Readings
What Does a College Resident Advisor (RA) Do? | BestColleges
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The Secret Crisis Affecting College RAs | Esquire
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