Posted April 2, 2015 by
Tags: The Liberal Arts My Wheaton
The Life of an RA
While it’s not unusual for many college students to live in four different buildings during their four years of college, that’s not the experience Kathryn Brightly '16 has had at Wheaton.
“My freshman year I lived on Fischer 4 West, and then sophomore year also,” Kathryn explains. “This year, I’m an RA on the same floor.” As part of Wheaton’s Residence Life staff, Kathryn, a junior, chose to forego the privileges that come with upperclassman housing—like having her own kitchen and unlimited “open floor” hours for opposite-gender visits—for the sake of embracing the unique joys and challenges of being a Resident Assistant on a floor of freshman and sophomore women.
“It’s been so fun to walk through their freshman year with them and just be with them as they experience Wheaton for the first time,” she says. “That has been my favorite part.” While Kathryn’s responsibilities as an RA are varied and include everything from specific coursework to meetings with the rest of the Residence Life staff, many significant aspects of RA life revolve around relationship-based, community-building activities. For Kathryn, these include making time for one-on-one meals with every girl on her floor, being available in her room for regular “in nights” so her floor mates can casually connect, hosting weekly tea times, attending floor dinners, and planning events with the RAs of her brother and sister floor.
These activities are articulated by Kathryn more as an inventory of blessing than as a to-do list. “I feel like I’m so privileged to be able to have room where people can come and feel safe and welcome and they can share their stories with me, both the joys and the sorrows,” she says.
She’s grateful, too, for the framework that Wheaton’s liberal arts education and her Christian Education major classes are providing when it comes to thinking about her RA experience. “It’s cool to see how you can disciple people in a one-on-one relationship,” she says. “I’ve really loved my classes because they seem so intertwined with the ministry that I’m doing as an RA.”
Despite all the things she loves about her role as a facilitator and leader on the floor, though, Kathryn also acknowledges the bumps along the way. “There’s so much in Residence Life that’s really challenging and hard and heavy,” she says. But in spite of difficulties, Kathryn clearly doesn’t regret her choices to get involved. “In reality, the Lord has put me in this position, but also he is the one who is performing and working, not me. This year has been a lesson of learning that I am, in reality, inadequate for this job. And that’s ok because the Lord is sufficient.”
Learn more about Wheaton College’s residence life on their website, apply to be a , and read more about Kathryn’s story on her author bio page Brightly, Kathryn '16.