The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 1 - 30

Rich Whitney * Sherry Early * Travis Whisler

The annual process of selection, training,
and supervision has evolved over the years
and the more contemporary term paraprofessional has been adopted for some student roles
within residential education programs with
the term RA included here (Winston & Fitch,
1993). A paraprofessional is deﬁned
As a student who is selected, trained, and
supervised in assuming responsibilities
and performing tasks that are intended
to (1) directly promote the individual
personal development of his or her peers,
(2) foster the creation and maintenance of
environments that stimulate and support
residents' personal and educational
development, and/or (3) perform tasks that
ensure the maintenance of secure, clean,
healthy, psychologically safe, and esthetically
pleasing living accommodations. (Winston &
Fitch, 1993, p. 317)
The RA role requires the paraprofessional
to pull from a wide skill set including role
model, programmer, and community builder,
all while maintaining his/her course load and
grade point average (Akens & Novak, 2011;
Newton & Ender, 2010; Winston & Fitch,
1993). Winston and Fitch (1993) argued there
are multiple and sometimes conﬂicting expectations of an RA that require mature, intelligent, skillful, dedicated paraprofessionals
to assume these roles. According to Blimling
(2010), residence hall staff should have basic
skills in cultivating student development,
counseling/helping, knowledge of resources,
administrative organization and time management, peer education through programming
and role modeling, leadership, crisis management, and human relations. However, these
weighty responsibilities could lead to burnout
(Fuerhrer & McGongle, 1988). The competing

30

demands and dynamic roles RA fulﬁll make it
difﬁcult to articulate if the "perfect" RA exists,
or how to train/build that person (Early, 2014;
Kennedy, 2009; Powell, Plyer, Dickson, & McClellan, 1969).
The Council for the Advancement of Standards (CAS) in Higher Education (2012), as
well as other sources on residential life (e.g.,
Akens & Novak, 2011; Schuh, 1996; Winston
& Fitch, 1993) present more of a case for the
overall residential education experience than
RA training. With regard to CAS, the role
of the RA is mentioned in the Human Resources section with other stafﬁng issues/
topics. Cumulatively, there are thousands
of dollars, program hours, and resources to
support the important ﬁrst line role of these
paraprofessionals. Despite the ubiquity of the
RA experience, there seems to be a dearth of
training models, templates, or protocols. Campuses have created unique training models
(i.e., proprietary) and schedules that have
common themes, skills, and topics based on
the residence life literature. This article does
not suggest these campuses are wrong, but
it seems odd there is little attention given to
this large student worker/leadership population. The modern climate of accountability, assessment (Keeling, et al., 2008; Suskie, 2009;
Maki, 2010), standardization, and competencies (ACPA & NASPA, 2010) exist to connect
residential education work to experiential education and may be helpful for practitioners.
While residence life literature discusses the
importance of RA training programs, there
have been no standard templates or models
presented to aid practitioners with development and implementation (Blimling, 2010;
Murray, Snider, & Midkiff, 1999; Kennedy,

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The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 1

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