Anonymous asked: what are the work hours like as an RA? does the job allow you to leave campus for some weekends?

Answer:

This answer really depends on the housing program at an individual university.

For me at FGCU, housing believes we work an average of 20 hours a week as a RA. Some weeks there isn’t much to do. At the beginning of the month I have to do a bulletin board (this takes a lot more hours than one thinks it would -_-). Then there is planning and running a minimum of a monthly program, so that week perhaps you are doing the 20 hours and the week before maybe 10. We are required to have 5 hours devoted to RA hours which is included in the 20 hour estimation, but really I am just sitting in my room and available during set times if a resident needs something. Then we are required to work 5 hours unpaid at the desk, which is one 3 hour shift and a 2 hour shift when we are on call. I have to be on call once a week (bust parties, do lockouts, etc) and then once every 5 weeks I get a weekend on call. I am allowed to leave campus (I usually don’t though), but they ask us not to leave more than one weekend a month. We can’t do a good job if we are gone too much. However, in March I will be gone two weekends for two conferences and that is fine. There are RAs that have free time, and perhaps they do a good job but usually not. The best RAs don’t have much outside of the job. I don’t mean to say people don’t have friends or lives, but with anything, you can only do so much before you sacrifice greatness. I tend to spend time hanging out with my residents in the hallway, and this takes up a good deal of time. I enjoy it though and it allows me to know residents better, which means I can plan things they will enjoy or know who to watch out for. Additionally, at FGCU we are allowed to work up to 15 hours a week at the front desk or at an outside workplace. So, I work the extra 15 paid hours. I try to use this time to double up. It took almost two hours to write 40 Christmas cards to my residents at the front desk, and nearly 5 hours putting together balloons for finals. Then making door decs, cutting them out, laminating them, cutting that out and then taping them to their doors can take 2-4 hours… maybe more if they are handmade. It adds up! So, December meant a lot of extra random work, but sometimes it is easy to use your time to hit two birds. If one really enjoys it though, the time doesn’t feel so much like work.