SPRING 2020
Get to Know the Team p2 Assignments and Public Inquiry Room Selection and Assignments Updates p5 South Campus Commons and The Courtyards Apartment Selection p6 Off-Campus Housing p7 Afghan Refugee Program p9 DEI Update p10 Human Resources Update p12 Vision Mission Values Workteam Update p13 Johnson-Whittle Hall p15 Year End Programming p16 Year by the Numbers p18 Y2022 Pillar Recipients p18
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Get to Know the Team: Assignments and Public Inquiry! Assignments & Public Inquiry is responsible for managing the life cycle of all student housing assignments, from application through check-out. Assignments manages applications for new and returning students. We also manage release requests, buyouts, and questions about student obligations. Assignments is responsible for enforcing the Terms & Conditions of the housing agreement. Throughout the year, we also manage room changes, facilities moves, administrative moves, and medical room changes. Assignments collects and disseminates information regarding approved early arrival housing, break housing, summer housing, and housing designated for studentathletes. The Public Inquiry staff field over 20,000 calls, emails, and walk-in visits per year, engaging with students, parents, and families of prospective, incoming, current, and former UMD students. The Assignments and Public Inquiry staff serve as the front line to help answer student questions and concerns and often collaborate with other offices to provide specific information about their functions and processes. Assignments and Public Inquiry staff are well-versed in a wide range of information, including knowledge of processes and procedures happening currently and in future semesters. Though the volume of correspondence can be challenging at times, our staff do their best to ensure timely and accurate information is available to students. Our goal is to help students be prepared to meet the expectations set by Resident Life to ensure a low-stress, high-impact experience in the residence halls.
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Res Life Roundup | Spring 2022 | Vol. 5
Matt DiCicco
Glenn Smith
Assistant Director, Housing Management Favorite Part of Your Job: Finding new ways to make StarRez an easier, more effective tool for our staff and students to use. Interesting Fact: I was born with one extra tooth, and my brother was born short one tooth.
Manager, Assignments and Public Inquiry Favorite Part of Your Job: Helping solve problems on the call sheet. Interesting Fact: I collect comic books!
Michelle McCubbin
Linda Dye
Assistant Manager, Assignments and Public Inquiry
Public Inquiry Coordinator, Assignments and Public Inquiry
Favorite Part of Your Job: Working with the LGBTQ+ students and their families to make sure they have housing that meets their needs.
Favorite Part of Your Job: Identifying issues with data integrity in StarRez and finding solutions.
Interesting Fact: I graduated from UMD. While I was a student, I lived on campus and worked at Hagerstown and Leonardtown Desks before I started working in the Assignments Office.
Interesting Fact: I love subscription boxes!
Isabella DeCarlo
Tony Prosseda
Public Inquiry Coordinator, Assignments and Public Inquiry
Public Inquiry Coordinator, Assignments and Public Inquiry Favorite Part of Your Job: The level of detailed work involved with early arrivals. Interesting Fact: I read at least 1 book/week.
Favorite Part of Your Job: Helping students and parents better understand UMD’s residential experience and processes.. Interesting Fact: I speak Italian!
Res Life Roundup | Spring 2022 | Vol. 5
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Room Selection & Assignments Updates Room selection was a bit tricky this year. We separated Living-Learning Program (LLP) room selection from our other processes, allowing students in those programs to select first. Over the two weeks of room selection, we had 3,491 students select spaces in the residence halls. Our typical popular spaces were in suites and apartments, which allow a different living experience for our returning students. Though the process functioned similarly to previous years, the return to full occupancy this year allowed all of our returning students to understand campus and their housing options prior to room selection. Students who selected housing were able to cancel their assignment until April 1 with no penalty. Since April 1, we have implemented our new buyout process, eliminating the petition process that students have become familiar with. Students can now be released for a qualifying reason (e.g. withdrawal, study abroad, graduation, etc.), or they can buy out the remainder of their agreement for a set amount. This will allow students who find alternative options to be released without having to go through a lengthy, all-or-nothing process that ended with many students being frustrated about their agreement. We anticipate seeing more requests throughout the summer as student plans change. We also have a new process for students requesting medical accommodations. No longer will students submit medical documentation to Michelle McCubbin for review and assignment. Beginning for Fall 2022, the Accessibility & Disability Service (ADS) will assume responsibility for receiving applications, working with students, and determining which accommodations are reasonable to meet the student’s needs. Students still need to complete a housing application with our office, but will apply for accommodations separately from ADS, the same way they would apply for classroom accommodations. We will continue to run a wait list for returning students in the halls, but are working to offer housing to as many students as we can. We are in the process of receiving preferences and assigning students to vacant spaces as they are available. If students are looking for other housing options in the halls, or want to test the waters regarding what has become available, they will be able to request a room change from June 6–24. After that time, student assignments will be locked in until our room change process begins in September.
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South Campus Commons and The Courtyards Apartment Selection The South Campus Commons and Courtyards apartment selection incorporated several new changes this year to help improve the overall process for students. The most notable change was the selection process timeline was advanced from the end of May to late February. This decision came from years of discussion about improving the process for both students and staff. Having students select their housing preferences earlier helped us be more competitive with the off-campus market and provided students with peace of mind knowing they had housing secured for next fall. P3 apartment selection was hosted on the StarRez Housing Portal again this year. However, a significant value-added this year was fully integrating DocuSign, which allowed students to receive their leases within minutes of making their housing selection.
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On February 28th, the first day of Apartment Selection, 1500 residence hall rising juniors and 138 residence hall rising seniors had appointments and we started with 1095 vacancies (801 in SCC and 294 in CTY). In contrast, last year, there were 1734 vacancies (1247 in South Campus Commons 487 in The Courtyards). A total of 993 spaces were selected on the first day (801 in SCC and 192 in CTY). On the second day of leasing (3/1), 1602 residence hall rising sophomores had appointments and there were only 102 vacancies left in The Courtyards and 0 in South Campus Commons. Additional improvements, such as 3D room layouts on the selection portal, are planned for 2023-2024 leasing.
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Off-Campus Housing Services This year the Off-Campus Housing Services (OCH) Office hired Eden Rivera as our Graduate Coordinator. She has done a great job getting acquainted with the office and updating our materials. OCH hosted their first in person Off-Campus Living Fair in two years and will host a virtual fair in June. Moving forward the office will likely offer one in person fair and one virtual fair to accommodate students who can not make it to campus in the summer. OCH also started hosting a weekly Zoom Office Hour in order to give students another way of connecting with the office. We would like to continue this in the future and anticipate an uptick in participation over the summer.
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Afghan Refugee Program The families are doing well and so thankful to have a home on our campus. We have several important partnerships with departments on campus and we are working on a few initiatives to help the families not only adjust to campus but to Maryland as a whole. Welcoming: The three families that moved in on April 4 were treated to a welcoming meal prepared by Krazi Kabob in College Park, paid for by Ken and Jaki Ulman (Ken is President of the Terrapin Development Company). Krazi Kebob’s owner, Nomie Hamid, was pleased to be able to prepare a halal meal for families during Ramadan. The iftar meals were delivered at sundown. A meal was also provided to the family that moved in on April 19. Dining Services provided all families with several boxes of dry foods in order to stock their cabinets. Dean of Libraries Adriene Lim arranged for her team to prepare welcoming baskets that included housewarming gifts and several books written in Pashto, the families’ native language. Mentor Teams: Professor Robert Koulish has organized three teams of undergraduate and graduate students who will interface directly with the families which started this month. All have been trained and completed background checks. The mentor interactions will help us gauge specific needs for each family, including language proficiency, interest in getting more ELS instruction, job needs and interests, and material needs such as household items, bikes, etc. They will also get introductions to other community resources, such as mosques, and a tour of the broader College Park area (e.g., parks, Lake Artemesia, other sites). ELS: The Maryland English Institute (MEI) is in position to provide supplemental instruction starting next month. We believe selected family members have been enrolled in fully online ELS classes, but as they don’t all have computers, they are getting instruction primarily through their cell phones, which isn’t optimal. MEI will provide an onsite instructor and classes will take place in the Leonardtown MPR. We are hoping to get at least one donated laptop per family. Dai-An is currently working on that initiative. Safety & Transportation: ElBonita and Lt. Kenner organized a “Shop with a Cop” event last month that was well received by the families. Clothing, shoes, toiletries, school supplies, and other items were given away free. Everyone had fun, especially the children, and they got to know the UMPD members better. The Department of Transportation Services donated bike helmets and bike locks for the families, which will be greatly appreciated as it doesn’t appear they have any of these. DOTs also arranged to give each family a temporary parking pass for use when relatives who live in the area visit. These will allow a car to be parked during the day in the 16 or J2 lots. DOTs created pass cards as an alternative to IDs that will allow the families to use the campus shuttle buses. These have been distributed to the families. DOTS also donated three refurbished bikes and we are hoping more will come once the semester ends. Facilities: Our facilities team have made sure to be sensitive to the cultural needs of the families and although for safety reasons they are not able to remove their shoes before entering the home, they have purchased shoe coverings for all of their team.
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I
nitiatives
This year, we embarked on evaluating progress related to the Diversity & Inclusion Action Plan (DIAP), developing the second iteration of the DIAP, and creating a new DEI grounding document that will replace our Multicultural Philosophy. We have been intentional about gathering feedback throughout these processes and will continue to, with the hope of rolling out both later this summer. With many lessons learned from our first D&I Action Plan, we look forward to implementing the second iteration with more attention to organizational change and collaborative action. We will be incorporating the Equity Tank Model, a model developed by Student Affairs professionals who formerly worked at Towson University in residence life, and introducing this at DRL Connect.
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tudent Education & Engagement
This semester, we welcomed 12 new Peer Dialogue Leaders who recently completed their 70-hour, 3-credit training internship. To conclude their experience, the PDLs facilitated a variety of Common Ground dialogue sessions for residents. Traditionally, the capstone experience for PDLs in training has been facilitating four-session dialogue groups with the RA Class. With the move to RA Groundwork, Ben has worked hard to create new opportunities and partnerships. This semester, we worked with College Park Scholars and coordinated 4 dialogue groups on a topic related to equitable food access and sustainability. Sixty students from the Environment, Technology, & the Economy Program participated in four-session dialogue groups, and it was a great success for our PDLs and the student participants. Additionally, the newly-trained PDLs led one-session and two-session dialogues for the RA staff teams in Oakland, Easton, Centreville, and Leonardtown. The topics for these dialogues were related to responding to non-inclusive speech in a university setting. We hope to continue offering one- and two-session dialogues for our student staff teams. During the past few years, the pandemic and virtual classes and programming effected both our PDL internships and the number of Multicultural Advocates. After growing to 6 in 2019-2020 (the program’s 2nd year), we had 2 MAs for the past two years. We are excited to announce that we will have 5 MAs for the 2022-2023 academic year! Our 5 incoming MAs
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are Adanna Kwapong, Ellie Lippa, Kaitlyn Kim, Lucas Rivero, and Natalie Davis. All of them are rising juniors who just completed PDL Training. We are still determining which residence halls they will be working with – be on the look out for more information in our D&I in Action Newsletter!
Staff Development & Training
Our highlights for Staff Development & Training related to DEI include engagement around the DEI theme of Cross-Cultural Engagement and our Coffee & Conversation series. We had multiple sessions with the authors of Identity-Conscious Supervision in Student Affairs: Building Relationships & Transforming Systems with our Leadership Team, at DRL Summit, and a DSA/ SADI Indaba. As we focused on identity-conscious supervision within the theme this year, we are excited to delve into our 2022-2023 theme, Identity-Conscious Communication. This theme focuses on communication across differences, engaging with conflict across identity groups, and facilitation around identity-related incidents & issues. We will be sharing more about the upcoming theme at DRL Connect in July. This year, we shifted our article discussion series from Heritage & History Month discussions to “Coffee & Conversations”, borrowing a program from our Multicultural Advocates and focusing on current issues related to DEI to discuss in community with each other. We held several this year in person and virtually, facilitated by many of our staff! We are very excited to continue this next year, and are working on a partnership with RecWell to collaborate on a few programs to bring our staffs together throughout the semester to discuss DEI-related issues and our work.
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einventing our housing program as a mostly-singles community
In addition to transitioning to a program of mostly single occupancy rooms, our staff bent over backwards to give flexibility to students and families navigating the decision about whether to live on campus or not last fall. We changed and/or extended our cancellation deadline at least five times and extended a guarantee of Fall 2021 housing to this year’s first-year students who preferred to live at home this year.
Res Life Roundup | Spring 2022 | Vol. 5
DEI Update Our DEI Team and 4 committees (D&I Staff Development & Training, Student Diversity Programs, D&I Action Plan Steering Team, and DEI Grounding Document Taskforce) have been hard at work this year coordinating programs, facilitating trainings and discussions, evaluating progress, and further developing our programs. Below are a few highlights as well as things we are looking forward to next year.
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Human Resources Update The DRL Human Resources (HR) team’s portfolio has expanded with the addition of Conferences and Visitor Services (C&VS), adding 100 student staff and 20 professional staff members. Together with Resident Life this brings our roster to around 700 student staff and 110 prostaff - and that’s a big undertaking. I have been so impressed with the HR Team’s ability to shift and integrate C&VS into our operations. By far Sylvia, with Joelle’s assistance, has managed the bulk of this work as she onboarded both the unexpected COVID Testing employees beginning in March 2021, and now she is onboarding their first summer student staff cohort since the pandemic began. Usually we would have a break except at the semester transitions but the load is much more constant and heavier than it used to be in the past. We’ve been really fortunate to have strong processes in place, a team that works great together, and helpful tools in MyDRL and maybe soon StarRez (thank you G and Tom!). Our unit has always had to manage a lot of physical paperwork and checks due to the University’s payroll processes. The addition of C&VS during COVID times has been an additional challenge. Our team does not have the ability for as much of our work to be completed virtually or flexibility in telework scheduling as some other parts of the department might. I am fortunate to work with a team that understands their responsibilities and is taking this in stride as much as possible. We work really hard to support each other so everyone still has telework options and that personal support. One of the things that I’ve most enjoyed is getting to know the staff in C&VS, learning about their operations, and partnering with them in new ways. They are a smaller unit and I think have benefited by having a team of dedicated HR staff to support. Since we operate out of the same residence halls, I really see it as an extension of what we do for Resident Life. Besides the increase of students and prostaff employees added to the roster to maintain, the biggest change has been the constant workflow. Prior to acquiring C&VS the summer would be our slow period. Now with the summer programs that C&VS runs our workflow has not only increased but it is constant, so I think it is going to be a challenge to manage. However C&VS has been very receptive to being integrated into our payroll process which has made the transition easy for all involved.
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Vision Mission Values Workteam Update The VMV Workteam has been busy collecting data and reviewing feedback during the Spring Semester! Our stakeholder survey received over 200 responses and through feedback sessions with DRL staff, we were able to collect input to inform the process. Our committee is taking a pause while we wait for the Divisional VMVs to be released (hopefully by July 1st), but as soon as we have that critical information, we’ll be able to press forward with writing our new mission, vision, and values. Take a look at our revised timeline below.
Diversity & Inclusion were important themes to consider. While the specific terms “multicultural” and “social justice” were barely mentioned in our stakeholder survey or our feedback sessions, the ideas of creating a welcoming space for all and a focus on inclusion were very important to everyone. We can’t forget about the basics of our work. The theme of “housing” in our mission can’t be left out… it’s hard to focus on learning and connections if students don’t feel like we’ve taken care of their basic needs.
The survey to DRL regarding the themes elicited some interesting findings… Issues of Community & Connections and Learning & Development were important to staff both in terms of mission, vision, AND values. These were clearly critical to the work we do.
The theme survey results have been shared with the department. But we’d love to talk to you about it - feel free to reach out to any of us (Daniel, Laura, Genevieve, Candace, Erica, James, Scott, Tracy, Linh)!
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Johnson-Whittle Hall Johnson-Whittle Hall is a 450 bed traditional hall located in the Heritage Community. It will open this summer, and our inaugural RD, Kayla Hudson and CD, Aspen Shackelford will be its first residents! Johnson-Whittle Hall, will honor Hiram Whittle, the first African American man to be admitted to the university, and Elaine Johnson Coates, the first African American woman to graduate with an undergraduate degree. Johnson-Whittle is located next to the new dining hall, Yahentamitsi (Yah-hen-tuh-meet-c), also opening this summer, which will also feature a tribute to the Piscataway people through art, artifacts, and other educational materials. The official dedication of this exceptional new residence hall will happen in late September.
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End of the Year Programming North Campus Silent Disco Heritage Courtyard Target Audience: North Campus Residents Sponsored by the North Campus Community Staff Why: The North Campus Community staff wanted to host a culminating event to celebrate the conclusion of our first year back to full “normal” in-person residence hall experience. The Silent Disco is hosted at this date and time as safe-alternative programming on a day that has been used for students to consume alcohol and engage in behaviors that are contrary to the Gold Code. Attendance: 125
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Hall Council Field Day La Plata Beach Target Audience: Cambridge and Heritage Community Residents Sponsored by the Hall Councils of Cumberland, Pyon-Chen, Cambridge, Centreville Why: The Hall Councils hosted an end-of-the-semester field day to create an opportunity for North Campus Communities to socialize, build community and have a large program celebrating the warmer weather and a fun gathering before final exams.
Farewell to Hagerstown - Tye Dye Event Target Audience: Hagerstown Residents Sponsored: Hagerstown Staff
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Year by the Numbers We welcomed more than 12,000 students to on-campus housing this year. We tracked 1033 residence hall and PPP students who reported COVID
positive tests. 284 students were housed in our isolation housing program. We responded to more than 750 after-hours duty incidents; offering support, care, and assistance to students in crisis. We helped 3,142 returning students choose rooms in the residence halls next year during Room Selection. We and our partners at COCM helped 1,095 students choose rooms in South Campus Commons and The Courtyards during the P3 apartment selection and lease-signing process. We logged and distributed a total of 239,486 packages in the residence halls (179,731) and South Campus Commons and Courtyards (59,755). Presented at 28 in-person Admitted Student visit day sessions this spring;
welcoming and engaging with more than 5,500 newly admitted Terps and
their families. We welcomed back approximately 120 Resident Life Alumni for ice cream
and toured more than 900 people through our newest residence hall during Maryland Day (our largest crowd yet)! Awarded $6,250 in scholarship money to seven incredibly
deserving students! Raised $5,374 for our Resident Life Scholarships during UMD’s Giving Day this spring.
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Congratulations to our 2022 Department of Resident Life Pillar of Excellence Recipients Aaron Hood Erin Schlegel Jennifer Lindstrom Laura McCulley
Linh Nguyen Sylvia Thomas Tiffany Gaines‐Ekwueme
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We want to hear from YOU! What do you like most about the content? What new topics should we consider for future editions? Staff are invited to share ideas, feedback, and to contribute content to make this an inviting and helpful resource for all! We hope you enjoy the first edition and look forward to hearing your feedback. Send any thoughts to tkiras@umd.edu.
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