I’ve been a Resident Assistant at the University of Connecticut for around three months as a mid-year RA hire (more to come of this in my next article)! From getting my offer before Christmas to putting up boards before my residents moved back in from winter break, I’ve had about a month to fully acknowledge that I’ll actually be an RA, something I’ve always wanted to do during my college career!
Though responsibility and communication (and more) are important skills to have as an RA, creativity is also a huge part of the job! I, for one, consider myself to be a very creative person; my imagination allows me to think of many cute, creative ways to put my artistic side to use to make my residents feel comfortable while living away from home. Back when I was a first-year student at UConn, I always loved seeing the board my and other RAs put up throughout the residence halls because it demonstrated the amount of effort they put into creating a safe, comfortable space for their residents.
So, when I finally had the opportunity to create not only one, but three boards for my floor, I was very ecstatic to bring my ideas to life with the creative freedom I had, even with for boards that already had content to be put up.
Without further ado, let’s look at my boards for this Spring semester!
meet your ra: Ashley
This was the first board I made! I put these up because I felt like they represented who I am as a person overall. Since it was all about me, I put some general information about myself as well as themes I like, such as:
- Purple, which is my favorite color.
- BT21 characters, which represent my favorite boy group, BTS.
- Music, more specifically, my favorite K-POP groups that I listen to.
- My best friend from my hometown who is an important person in my life.
- My nephew, whom I love and miss very much.
- New York City, which is not my hometown; however, it’s my favorite place to visit and it’s where I want to live in the future.
a floor full of sweethearts
I wanted to have a board that highlighted all of my residents living on the floor. Community and belonging are important to have while living in residence halls, and I wanted my residents to feel that sense of belonging and togetherness. Since my floor is all girls, and it was nearing Valentine’s Day, I decided to mix those variables to create our floor’s board! My own name is on my door instead.
Black History Month
One of our boards are dedicated to themes related to the upcoming month and are changed monthly (my next and final board is the end of the semester board for May).
As you can see, there was a lot of valuable and important information about inspiring African American historical figures! I wanted it to look as organized and easy to read as possible, and I’m happy with how it came out. I was on a time crunch at this point, so I didn’t have a chance to add more decorations. Since then, I have come to pre-plan my boards to make sure they are appealing while also informative.
National Nutrition Month
Once February ended, we had to put up a different board for March, which was about learning and improving physical and eating habits! The first day of Spring also falls in March, so I decided to make it Spring themes with frogs and leaves.
For basketball fans out there, this was also March Madness season…with UConn Women’s Basketball winning the championship! I had much faith in our basketball team and even put a first-place ribbon as good luck.
Go Huskies!
American Sign Language Day
Though not the entirety of April is dedicated to American Sign Language and its history, ASL Day does fall on April 15. These boards are meant to spread awareness about important concepts that fell in each month. I decided that I wanted to add a bit more spruce to the information provided and added visual ASL gestures and their meanings in case anyone wanted to know how to sign basic phrases, like hello or sorry.
One of my favorite Studio Ghibli films, My Neighbor Totoro, went well with April. There’s a saying, “April showers bring May flowers,” which reminded me of the rain scene in the movie. I highly recommend watching it!
I loved the creative freedom we had to decorate our boards however we wanted. It was fun to find ideas and cut pictures out; I’d even say it was therapeutic! I personally believe that being an RA is an amazing on-campus job opportunity to improve upon your leadership experience and strengthen your communication skills, while also having fun!