The Assistant Director of Residence Life position is a full-time, FLSA exempt, 12-month appointment within university residences reporting to the Director of Residence Life. This position assists the Director of Residence Life as one of the primary professionals on the leadership team for the residence life program, and is directly responsible for residential education, community development, and administrative processes for a campus community of approximately of 4,300 residential students in revenue generating spaces representing approximately $40 million in annual self-support revenue. As a member of the central leadership team in residence life, duties include mission and vision planning including implementation at various levels in the department, budget planning and management, ensuring effective collaboration with campus partners, leading staff selection and training processes, and providing leadership to all residence life staff to foster and assess student development. The Assistant Director of Residence Life is assigned responsibility for supervising three (3) to four (4) full-time, professional staff members, which may include Residence Directors and/or Supervising Resident Directors (who supervise full-time, professional Assistant Residence Directors). Additionally, this position serves in an on-call rotation with other residence life leadership, serving as after-hours decision-maker for all of the University Residences department, including response to a wide range of emergencies/crises situation and supervision of professional Residence Directors and Assistant Residence Directors on-call. The assistant director must demonstrate the ability to work with diverse populations and provide strategies in enhancing the support of underrepresented and marginalized students.

Under leadership of the Director of Residence Life, in all aspects of the position the Assistant Director is responsible for collaboratively leading the efforts of the residence life department as part of the leadership team. This includes significant incorporation of diversity, equity, and inclusiveness perspectives throughout functional responsibility areas, ensuring the processes address systemic bias.

Duties of the Position

Staff Supervision, Selection, Training, and Performance Evaluation

• Provide direct supervision, training, and evaluation for 3 - 4 full-time, professional resident directors (RDs) and/or Supervising Residence Directors, and indirect supervision for 1-2 full time Assistant Resident Directors and approximately 100 undergraduate paraprofessional staff.
• One assistant director on the leadership team will directly supervise the Inclusion Assistant Program. The Inclusion Assistants are student leaders who provide mentorship, programming, and intentional outreach to all students in the residence halls to educate and create strong communities that incorporate our values of accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• Create strategies to enhance the work of inclusive community building in the residence halls. Work closely with professional staff to ensure residential life staff are trained on issues of equity and inclusion, with particular emphasis on effectiveness in carrying out positional responsibilities in the residential environment.
• Through directing, coaching, mentoring, and evaluating staff, ensure staff perform assigned responsibilities in prescribed methods in accordance to standards established by department leadership.
• Regularly collect input from students, student staff and full-time staff to provide annual formal evaluations, as well as on-going informal feedback.
• Meet regularly with each professional staff individually to facilitate effective job performance as well as provide on-going professional development.
• Provide guidance and supervisory support to resident directors in developing and implementing residential programming, organized to create an atmosphere of self-directed learning and opportunity for working with other stakeholder offices in establishing positive student communities.

Student Development and Educational Leadership 

• Collaborate with leadership within University Residences to provide long-term strategic planning, short-term coordination of operations, and more immediate problem solving within the department. 
• Develop innovative programming strategies to support learning goals identified by the department.
• Provide leadership and coordinates departmental initiatives related to including accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusion (ADE&I) education into all aspects of the residential experience.
• Provide leadership, guidance, and assessment for the Affinity community/Living Learning Community program, comprised of multiple unique affinity communities.
• Support and advance departmental and institutional goals and values related to inclusive excellence.
• Collaborate with staff and faculty to assess and improve systems designed to support academically at-risk students.
• Collaborate with students, faculty, academic administrators and staff to enhance student learning through living-learning communities.
• Foster student leadership development through structures such as hall government and student staff training.
• Provide leadership in the development, implementation, interpretation and utilization of assessment to measure student learning and departmental effectiveness in achieving its goals.

Administrative Leadership 

• Serve in place of Director of Residence Life on a rotating basis when the Director is out of office
• Provide leadership in the development, implementation and assessment of department policies and processes.
• Serve as unit liaison for housing facility and maintenance related concerns, occupancy management and communications, the business office, and dining.
• Lead efforts on designated residence life initiatives including campus-wide partnerships and collaborative projects.
• Ensure residence life staff complete administrative tasks accurately and on-time and understand and adhere to all departmental and university policies, procedures and guidelines.
• Chair multiple committees within residence life on major operations such as training, recruitment and selection, equity and inclusion, and resident education.
• Assist the Director of Residence Life in development and review of the residence life budget, typically $3.5 - $4 million annually.
• Exercise signature authority for programming boards and staff programming budgets totaling $100,000 annually. Provide training and supervision to resident directors as they develop and execute programming budgets and advise student groups. Directly manage committee budgets for the recruitment and training of staff.
• Represent University Residences and Residence life with external stakeholders and exercise independent judgment in responding to and following up on stakeholder feedback and concerns, such as: inquiries from parents/families and the public related to incidents (e.g. student crisis, student misconduct, roommate conflicts) within parameters of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).

 On-Call / After-Hours Responsibility 

• Serve in Residence Life leadership on-call rotation, serving as after-hours decision-maker for Residence Life emergencies/crises and supervisor for professional Residence Directors and Assistant Residence Directors on-call.
• Provide immediate support and direction for student and professional staff responding to emergency situations such as suicidal behaviors/ideation, sexual harassment, sexual assault, eating disorders, depression, physical assault, domestic violence, anger management, alcohol and drug abuse/dependency/overdose, or psychotic episodes.
•  Provide leadership for professional and student staff in providing supportive response to individuals and communities affected by serious or large-scale incidents such as moving a student to interim housing, deciding if a student is able to remain in the residence hall system, arranging for group or individual crisis counseling, and contacting parents.
• Maintain strong liaison relationships with a variety of university resources including, but not limited to, Office of Student Life, Civil Rights and Title IX Compliance, Survivor Advocacy Services, Multicultural Center, Ethnic Student Center, Disability Access Center, University Conduct Officer, the Student Health Center, Counseling, Health, and Wellness, University Police, Student Outreach Services, Academic Advising, the Tutoring Center, and New Student and Family Outreach Services.
• Notify directors and/or higher administration of incidents that are media worthy, involve significant harm/risk to safety to the residential campus student and staff community.

Student Conduct and CARE 

• Under direction of Director of Residence Life and in coordination with Assistant Director of Residence Life of Care and Conduct, provide leadership and vision for conduct process and care interventions
• Provide training, guidance, and support for resident directors as they implement the conduct process, including hearings, conduct decisions, and educational sanctioning.
• Hear conduct appeals from residents, typically in high-level conduct cases (i.e. violations related to drugs, alcohol, or physical/verbal assault).
• Provide training, guidance and support to staff following up on a wide range of care-related situations (homesickness, mental health challenges, roommate challenges, etc.)

 Other Duties 

• Serve on the Residence Life Leadership Team
• Residence Life Area and Combined Staff Meetings
• University Residence department committee(s) as appropriate
• Enrollment and Student Services Divisional committee(s) as needed.
• Provide annually a summary of DEI considerations and impacts in area of responsibility to University Residences executive director and/or designee.

Required Qualifications

• Master's Degree
• Three years full-time management or administrative experience in college or university residence education.
• Experience leading in a diverse and inclusive environment and a demonstrated commitment to building inclusive communities within a residential environment (a one page equity and inclusion statement must be submitted as part of the application)
• Experience with training, recruitment, and selection for all levels of staff within a residential environment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supervising full-time, professional staff members (e.g. resident directors)
• Three to five years of progressively more responsible supervisory experience in college or university residential environments.
• Ability to develop educational strategies to foster student development and learning.
• Experience with crisis management.
• Professional, live-in residence hall or student housing staff experience.
• Ability to apply current student learning and development theories and research.