Starting this fall, resident mentors will be trading in their single rooms and will be required to have a roommate.
By implementing the change, Kathy Collins, director of Campus Living Services and Residence Life, said in an email residence halls can avoid more than 1,000 incoming students living three to a room in fall 2012. The roommates for resident mentors are aimed to be temporary, as Collins said each fall, about 400 students do not show up to live in residence halls for various reasons. Once open rooms are confirmed, students in transitional housing can move into them.
About 2,052 students were assigned to transitional housing in fall 2011, which means they had three people in a traditionally two-person dorm room, according to past State News articles.
Human biology junior Lauren Charlton, a resident mentor in Wilson Hall, said being required to have a roommate next year on top of new time commitments for resident mentors, including extra meetings and training, convinced her to resign from her position.
“It was either put up or get out, and I just decided to get out,” Charlton said.
From what she has heard around the resident mentor social circle, Charlton said many feel their duties in the residence halls will be in jeopardy with a roommate, as it might be difficult to work with residents on personal or living issues in a safe, private environment.
Collins said she recognizes resident mentors have mixed emotions about the situation and encourages conversation.
“I am in the process of setting up a series of meetings with mentors from across campus to discuss this situation more in depth,” she said in an email.
Art education freshman Marissa Reece, who is in transitional housing in Brody Complex Neighborhood, said she probably would have felt less comfortable with her living situation if she was placed with a resident mentor.
“I’d prefer to be living with other freshman who are experiencing the same things as me,” she said.
Communication sophomore Lindsey Funfgeld, a resident mentor in Holden Hall, said the changes next year are a small price to pay for such a rewarding opportunity.
“I love this job so much that there’s a not a lot I would give it up for,” she said.
But as a human biology senior, Jason Yamamoto, a resident mentor in Wilson Hall, said he worried sharing a room also might affect his ability to study for classes and resigned from his position as a resident mentor next fall.
“Most (incoming students) are freshmen, so living with freshmen is not something that is professional,” he said.
To prevent transitional housing, Residential and Hospitality Services also will be limiting the number of singles available and calling perspective students who choose not attend MSU to cancel their housing reservations, Collins said in the email.
Charlton said leaving her position won’t be easy.
“It is difficult to walk away from this job,” she said. “It’s free room and board, which is a lot of money — I wish they had given us more time.”
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