If I could time travel and talk to my impassioned-undergraduate-student-leader-self, I think she would be pretty pleased with how things look on paper. With almost a decade of experience at various institutions across the country, I’ve worked hard to become a successful mid-level residence life professional, which puts me right on track to become a director of housing or university vice president down the line. Perhaps, however, after a few minutes of talking, that past version of me would see just how differently I view my work now. ResLife is no longer for life, but it is for now.
This blog series features different writers responding to the prompt, “What is one practice ResLife departments need to let go of?”
To be clear, my years of experience have proven to me just how essential great leadership is in a department and at a university. In fact, creating policies, providing a vision, and having the power to impact large-scale change is incredibly important work. While I’m not suggesting those roles are not worth striving for, I did not think through what the journey to becoming a director would actually mean.
The primary function of my current role consists of being a channel for knowledge dissemination. Much of my day is processing information, deciding what’s important, and figuring out how to best deliver that to the appropriate parties. It’s much less decision-making and student engagement, and much more prioritizing and interpreting. Not only is this not the way I envisioned spending my time, but I would also need to spend several more years doing it before I would even be qualified to be a director.
While I accepted this hard truth, the COVID-19 pandemic began to transform college campuses. Students suddenly had starkly different needs and the residence halls felt distinctly different than before. I wondered, if it took less than five years for this massive transformation, how much change might the profession of residence life endure over the decades of my working years to come? As I schemed plans to predict the future of the profession out of stress and fear, reality began to sink in: maybe instead of making a commitment to an inherently unpredictable profession, I might consider simply making a commitment to myself. Perhaps it was time to put my energy into my character, values, and interests that weren’t driven by my work identity.
Fast forward to the present, and I like pouring time and attention into my creative hobbies, buying concert tickets, sharing laughter with friends, going to therapy, planning plenty of trips, and dreaming about the next city I want to live in. I’ve found that these things still make ResLife a good fit, at least for now. I now also trust that my future self, who may have different priorities, can decide if ResLife is for her later on, too. Maybe your ResLife role works for now because it allows you to spend time with your family, live in a city you love, save money, or spend the bulk of your summer away from work. Regardless, I wonder how your ResLife is serving you.
While work is no longer everything, 40 hours a week is a lot of time to do anything, and I’m still committed to reflecting on what I’m learning, what brings me joy, and what feels easy. As an Assistant Director, I like building relationships and learning from my colleagues’ wisdom. The variety in my weekly schedule is valuable to me, and I appreciate how much my extroversion thrives in days full of meetings and collaboration. I know that the management, collaboration, and public speaking skills I am growing align with work I see for myself in the future. For you, ResLife for now might look like creating award-winning Instagram content for RHA, developing an engaging curriculum, practicing counseling skills, creative event planning on a budget, leading fun & educational trainings, or creating the world’s most efficient spreadsheet. These opportunities all sound like great preparation for a future director of housing. And, they also
sound like great preparation for dozens of professions. Consider how you can set yourself up for future success without overlooking the present.
If the thought of your career trajectory still feels daunting, destressing, or deceiving, and you don’t know where to start, I hope you remember that your work is only a part of you, and not the whole you. Simply put, your job simply cannot care for you like you can care for yourself. Frankly, no amount of professional development, empathetic conversations with close colleagues, or warm fuzzy feelings from working with students will ever be enough to fix low self esteem, health concerns, or fears about the future. Those things are addressed and healed not through a career, but rather, through love, and as author David Wong advises in This Book Is Full of Spiders, “You save love for the things that can love you back.”
In addition to personal and individual reflection, I think ResLife departments bear a responsibility to consider the narratives they are creating about the profession for their employees. If you serve in a leadership capacity I implore you to consider:
- How might you shift your focus from advancement to skill development?
- How are you modeling identity development that doesn’t only rely on your job functions and goals?
- What are ways can you invest in the futures of entry-level staff without piling on pressure to commit to decades in the field?
