One of the hardest lessons to learn in a student leader role, such as being an RA, is that caring about someone does not mean you are responsible for fixing every one of their problems.
That realization can be a difficult distinction to make when your role is built around helping people. As an RA, you’re often the person residents come to when something has gone wrong. Maybe they’re struggling with a roommate, having a difficult week, don’t know where to go for help, or just need someone to listen. These are things that generally, you can assist with or be there to help them through. You’re there as a support beam, and it can feel really good to know that you made someone’s day a little easier.
The tricky part comes when supporting someone starts to feel like being responsible for them.
It’s easy to fall into the mindset that if your resident is unhappy, you should be able to make them feel better. If they have a problem, you should be able to solve it. If they are struggling, you should be able to find the right answer. When you care about your residents, it can be surprisingly difficult to watch someone continue to struggle after you have tried to help them.
My staff has heard me say this before, and I’ll say it again: “Walk a mile in their shoes, and then walk a mile with them. Understanding their experience isn’t worth anything if you can’t apply what you’ve learned.” With this in mind, you’re not expected to carry that person while you walk that mile.
Your job is not to run your residents’ lives for them. Your job is to help them learn how to navigate their own lives.
Sometimes that means something as simple as providing a resource they weren’t aware existed. It can be helping them think through their options, or sitting with them while they figure out what they want to do next. And sometimes it means saying something that a lot of people hesitate to say: “I don’t know the answer to that.” And when you say this, you need to follow it up with: “But I can help you find someone who does.” That second half of the statement makes the first one perfectly fine to say. You’re not expected to know every answer, resource, or have the perfect sentiment to share when someone is going through a hard time.
Sometimes helping someone means doing a warm handoff and putting the issue in someone else’s hands. Serious concerns and safety issues are examples of situations that should involve professional staff – and these are often things where once you do that handoff, you don’t know every detail anymore. That should be when you can lean on your supervisor or campus leadership and trust that they’re addressing the issue. And you’ve done your job by providing them with the best-equipped resource at your disposal.
Having boundaries doesn’t mean refusing to help when help is genuinely needed. It means remembering that support and responsibility are not the same thing. You can help someone without taking ownership of their problem. That distinction matters for the big things, but I think it matters just as much for the small things.
Think about the resident who locks themselves out of their room. The first time, you don’t think much of it. You help them get back in, maybe make a joke about remembering their keys next time, and move on with your night. Then it happens again. And again. Eventually, they might start relying on you as their solution. They know that if they forget their keys, you’ll be there. They may not even think of it as asking too much because each individual request seems so small.
But the small things still take time. They still interrupt your studying, your sleep, your plans, or your downtime. More importantly, repeated small requests can create a pattern where you are doing something for a resident that they are perfectly capable of learning to do themselves. This is when helping them can mean setting a boundary.
You might help them figure out how to avoid getting locked out in the future, or remind them where to go for assistance when appropriate. At a point, you probably need to tell them that you cannot continue being their personal lockout service. And when you do that, you’re not being uncaring; you’re giving them the opportunity to take responsibility for something that belongs to them.
The same principle applies when the problem is much more serious. You can care about a resident who is struggling without becoming responsible for whether they make the choices you hope they will make. You can listen to someone talk about a difficult situation without becoming their therapist, and you can help someone navigate a conflict without taking the conflict on as your own. You can connect someone with a resource, but you can’t control whether they actually use it.
One of the most useful questions you can ask yourself is, “Am I helping this person, or am I taking responsibility for this person?”
I think sometimes we’re afraid that setting boundaries means we care less. It can feel easier to keep saying yes than to admit that something is wearing us down. But you can’t sustainably care for other people by taking every problem they bring you and carrying it yourself.
You’re a person and student, too. You have classes, friends, responsibilities, your own problems, and a life outside of your role. Your residents deserve an RA who cares about them, but they also deserve an RA who has enough capacity left to keep showing up.
So don’t NOT care. Listen, help, and connect people with resources. Step in when you need to, and be there for the people who need you. Just remember that “this matters to me” and “this is mine to fix” are two very different things.
Sometimes the most helpful thing you can do is not fix the problem for them, but help them learn that they can handle it themselves.
