Established a Community Within College Residential Life to Aid in the Transition From Dependent to Independent Living for Students.

In my first semester of Freshman year, I learned the power of this Tina Fey quote “Start with a 'Yes' and see where that takes you.” Like most of my classmates, I desired to make new friends and to enjoy my time in my Freshman dorm.  Little did I know that a Hall Council advertisement would be a beacon call to a multitude of leadership and growth experiences. My ‘yes’ was merely a desire to be a member of the Hall Council, which led me to become the Director of Recruitment and Retention which turned out to be a role I was both good at and enjoyed. I took on the responsibility of increasing and sustaining engagement in Hall Council meetings and events. With this tall task of gaining the attention of busy students, I learned the value of building community: not only my personal dorm community but broadly across the whole UW residential community.

What I learned about myself from this leadership experience is that focusing on engagement and inclusion is an important endeavor to build connection and community.  Engagement and inclusion have been a value that I had developed during high school when I got involved with mentoring younger students and being a part of the Best Buddies program. In my Freshman year at UW, I found that organizing events and helping to bring the dorm community closer was rewarding. As a large portion of the community were freshmen, the mission of Hall Council was to help ease the transition of college life and create a sense of belonging. We emphasized inclusion and by hosting cultural events such as dumpling-making, and creating a safe space, by hosting relaxation weeks before finals to bring awareness to mental health.

| Accomplishments

The year that I was the Director of Recruitment and Retention, my Hall Council won hall of the year; an award given to the hall that did the most for the residential community.

I used the following tactics to build our award-winning community:

  • Oversaw a 5 person committee to execute events for over 100 people by

    • Managing a budget, creating event campaigns, scheduling locations, ordering supplies, and executing the events.

    • Organizing a food drive with other resident halls and collected over 100 pounds of donated food for the local shelter.

  • Created communication campaigns by

    • Creating flyers, drafting emails, and sharing my personal experiences on Hall Council to motivate others to join.

      • I found that telling my personal experiences was an important tactic; telling only goes so far, showing passion and dedication is a stronger motivator.

  • Build a community within the organization by

    • Running icebreaker activities at every meeting

      • Icebreakers made the meetings more casual and fun and helped people get to know other members better.

The executive and community representative team for Lander Hall Council 2018

The executive and community representative team for Lander Hall Council 2018

| Competencies Gained

During my time as the Director of Recruitment and Retention, I learned about what it personally means to be a leader. I learned that as a leader I value building a community. This community allows for greater quality of work and increases the morale of all within the organization. Through this experience, I also gained many leadership competencies.

Personal Value

I learned about the importance of knowing my personal values and developing solutions to situations that threatened them. I have a value of commitment, which was sometimes a struggle for Hall Council members. Oftentimes I found myself frustrated with the lack of commitment some members showed, and how that made my experience worse. It made me realize the importance of communication and being honest about your ability to commit. I found that those who were honest about their commitments made handling the situation easier than those who did not communicate. This frustrating experience is what led me to create an icebreaker to teach others about the value of communication. This icebreaker was a game where pairs of 2 people had to complete a drawing task, the catch was that one person who had the drawing had to recreate in front of them while the other partner had to recreate the image solely from the verbal instructions their partner gave them. Through doing this icebreaker, members learned how clear communication is an important factor in accomplishing group goals. I took the responsibility of influencing others to see the value of communicating your level of commitment to help make my job easier and ultimately to create a successful group.

Created valentines to give to Lander Hall Council members and other Hall Councils. Through these cards I wanted to show my appreciation for the members of Hall Council and all the work they have done. This personal touch added a greater sense of com…

Created valentines to give to Lander Hall Council members and other Hall Councils. Through these cards I wanted to show my appreciation for the members of Hall Council and all the work they have done. This personal touch added a greater sense of community within the group.

Motivation

Motivation was a big component of my experience in Hall Council. Working as the Director of Recruitment and Retention I learned more about what it means to be driven, and how that drive can look different for other people. It was my job to motivate others to be committed to their role. As I was working to solve this problem of varying levels of commitment, I did research on what people are motivated by, and I came across examples of positive reinforcement through incentives or negative reinforcement through punishment. As I was working towards my goal of building a comfortable community within Hall Council, I decided it was best to use positive reinforcers to keep the atmosphere light. I implemented incentives such as a raffle for attendance to motivate people to participate in Hall Council activities. Each time someone attended a meeting their name would be added into the raffle to win some Lander Hall merchandise. By implementing this raffle incentive, I increased the motivation to come to meetings, and consistent attendance increased by 20%.

 

Diversity

An important value of mine is diversity and as a member of Hall Council, I was able to implement that value through inclusive programming events throughout the year. Some events we put on were a traditional Chinese New Year dinner, an informational movie night about African American leaders for Black History Month, and an LGBTQ+ festival. The team focused on ways to increase our knowledge on these subjects and be respectful when creating these events. We accomplished this by doing desk research on the history and tradition of these celebrations and collaborating with community members with those identities to learn about their personal experiences and knowledge to create traditional and informed events. I learned the importance of including those who represent the community you are celebrating in the planning of events to avoid inappropriate assumptions about a group. This value of diversity pushed me to recognize my need to be more informed and open to learning about other communities and to work hard to include everyone with all backgrounds in the planning and ideating process.

Can drive that I organized, partnering with other Hall Councils. Collected over 100 pounds of canned food across all halls.

Can drive that I organized, partnering with other Hall Councils. Collected over 100 pounds of canned food across all halls.

Taking initiative

Taking initiative was a competency I activated during my time in Hall Council which built my confidence as a leader. An example of this was when I was motivated to organize an event that gave back to the greater U-district community. I talked to my supervisor about working with an outside organization on an event and decided on a food drive to give back to our local community. I took initiative on the project by collaborating with other Hall Councils, advertising the event, and communicating with the food bank. My initiative and hard work paid off as we donated over 100 pounds of food. This success helped me build my confidence in my ability to put thought into action. Sometimes taking initiative can be intimidating and anxiety-inducing, however, this positive experience has pushed me to take initiatives in other organizations that I am part of, such as creating an executive roundtable meeting with other colleges who participate in Special Olympics to learn from each other's experiences. I learned that if you have an idea and are passionate about the cause, taking the initiative to make the idea a reality increases confidence for future efforts.

Resilience

Things do not always go smoothly when working as a group, and it was through these tough experiences that I learned about resilience. Oftentimes, I would find myself taking on extra Hall Council responsibilities in order to get things done even though other council members could pitch in. Planning, organizing, and running various events often by myself became overwhelming and isolating. I sometimes became frustrated about the fact that I seemed like the only one who cared but instead of giving up on Hall Council, but eventually I was motivated to push through the frustration to find a solution. I worked with my supervisor to find a way to lessen the burden on me and spread the responsibility more evenly. Together we came up with the idea of creating smaller committees responsible for one event for the quarter instead of the entire Hall Council creating each event together. By creating these smaller groups, more members felt invested in their work and took on more responsibility for planning and executing the event. I was able to spend less time working on the details of the event and work on higher-level work by managing and delegating tasks to the committee. This change helped me resolve the issue of taking on too much responsibility. That experience gave me the tools I needed to define what my roles are within an organization and taught me how to push through problems by coming up with creative solutions.

Group Development

The most important competency I learned was group development. I learned about the dynamic of a group, how there are leaders and listeners, outgoing members and shy ones, and they all have a role to play within the organization. As a leader, it is important to understand these differences and develop a sense of shared purpose among them all. As the Director of Recruitment and Retention, I managed to accomplish this by making fun, inclusive, and meaningful icebreakers at each meeting that catered to all different types of people. I created a ‘get to know me’ bingo sheet where members went around asking people personal questions such as ‘has traveled abroad’ and ‘speaks multiple languages’. This bingo sparked conversations that brought members closer together by learning about common interests or experiences. Another ice breaker I created was solving a puzzle as small teams to help more shy members feel comfortable talking. The activity also created a friendly competition which built a sense of unity among members, teaching them the importance of group development. I not only created a sense of belonging and unity but enhanced teamwork skills which were used later in our group work.

Pot a plant event, where students decorated pots for succulents they got to keep. We partnered with Students Expressing Environmental Dedication (SEED) to teach residence about good environmental practices and inspire them to take care of the enviro…

Pot a plant event, where students decorated pots for succulents they got to keep. We partnered with Students Expressing Environmental Dedication (SEED) to teach residence about good environmental practices and inspire them to take care of the environment.

| What I Have Learned

Working as the Director of Recruitment and Retention has shaped me as a leader and helped me activate my value of community building in other leadership positions since my Freshman year. In my current internship, I make an effort to establish a personal connection with my colleagues which makes trust and communication easier which in turn facilitates successful project completion. In my role as the VP of Outreach for Special Olympics, I engage in community-building activities such as posting discussions on our Facebook page to encourage interaction outside of our weekly meetings to enhance our team cohesion. As the Committee Head for Alumni and Networking in the engineering sorority Phi Sigma Rho, I build community by facilitating communication between current members and alumni through creating networking events. I think building a sense of unity within an organization is important to motivate members to perform their best work and makes the work more enjoyable. I am glad that I took the risk to “Start with a 'Yes'” on my Freshman Hall Council. The experience has helped me have a stronger awareness of myself as a leader and has provided me clarity about my desire to create inclusive community experiences in my leadership endeavors.