Talking Stick - July/August 2011 - 52

CONTINUED

Making Gender-Neutral Housing Work

developing a formal process was akin to putting folks in a box that didn’t necessarily ﬁt in a box. We decided we would work with individuals on a case-by-case basis. Fortunately, the numbers are at a level that make this approach sustainable,” says Mario Muñoz, assistant director of apartment assignment services at UC Santa Barbara. Muñoz conducts personal interviews with residents to understand their unique needs and to gather information that would help in making roommate assignments. After completing the personal interview, Muñoz calls potential roommates to make personal contact about the pending roommate match: “I tell them what I am looking for in consideration of what the original applicant discussed with me. If they are comfortable with living with the person, I’ll either make the assignment or connect them with each other, if that makes more sense. If they are not completely comfortable, I move on to the next person.” He ﬁnds that what he refers to as a simple, organic process is often heartwarming: “The ﬁrst time I did this process, I needed three roommates. After leaving messages and getting calls back, I ended up speaking with seven people. Every one of them offered to be roommates with this student. There was even some disappointment from one student that did not get assigned to the unit.” Offering a gender-neutral housing option may involve some additional elements in staff training programs. “We do an extensive social justice training program with all our staff, which includes gender and sexual orientation issues,” says Koerting. The University of California, Riverside offers training opportunities for all those who may be involved in the community. “Our staff in this area receive training on LGBT allies and gender identity development. Additionally, we have offered training to our housekeeping, assignments,
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and maintenance staff on LGBT identity and what they may see while working in this community. We also educate on posters and symbols of the community that they may see around them,” says Smith. Ohio University is prepared to offer specialized training to student staff who will work in the cluster of buildings where the gender-neutral assignments are housed. “Although this program will be located on one ﬂoor, we will provide training to all resident assistants in that complex. Our training program for all resident assistants includes a signiﬁcant diversity component; however, we are currently developing a more inclusive training for the gender-neutral staff,” says Sheets. Cole, however, found that there was no need to expand training for staff in the gender-neutral areas: “During the resident assistant hiring process, we will seek out applicants who have expressed interest in having the gender-free housing on their ﬂoor. However, we don’t do any additional training with them since the students in gender-free housing don’t necessarily identify as GLBTQ. From our focus groups, we’ve found they mainly like having that option of living with their friends or other people of the opposite gender.”

their anticipated outcome of this community,” says Sheets. Western Washington ties its assessment initiatives to the research that initially led to the implementation of genderinclusive housing. This research, conducted by the Gender Inclusive Committee, included consulting peer institutions, researching LGBTQ student experiences, and reviewing related standards set by the Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education (CAS). “University residences undertake a quality-oflife survey every year, and our living clusters get special sections to answer. Because the cluster is new, we have plans to run focus groups several times during the year and to survey the cluster residents in spring. We will assess how well we met our learning outcomes and goals,” Walker explains. In addition to assessment, the lessons learned from established programs can be invaluable for residence life professionals seeking advice or insight on newer programs. Smith recommends working with stakeholders who can serve as collaborative partners. “Partner with your students and your LGBT resource center if you have one. Working with our LGBT center has been great in that often they refer students to us, or we refer to them. Additionally they assist us with working through issues students may face or needing genderneutral housing,” says Smith. Perhaps echoing the sentiments of many others, Koerting vows she wouldn’t do anything differently if given the chance to start building Wesleyan’s gender-neutral program over: “I wouldn’t change anything, as we learned as much from our mistakes TS as our successes.”
Stacy Oliver
is the assistant director of housing and residential life at Indiana University, South Bend. is the assignments and systems manager at Oregon State University in Corvallis.

Assessing the Results
Focus groups and other forms of assessment play a critical role in understanding students’ experiences in gender-neutral housing and ensuring that the programs are meeting the institution’s goals. “We will complete both a pre- and post-assessment process utilizing the Educational Benchmarking Inc. Resident Satisfaction Survey. Participating residents will also meet as a focus group in the preceding spring quarter to discuss

Kathryn Magura

Talking Stick - July/August 2011

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