The decision to decrease the compensation of members of Residence Life’s student staff was recently finalized by Vice President for Student Life Eddie Ade Knowles and Vice President for Enrollment Jim Nondorf. The stated purpose of this measure is to “level out the playing field” among residence directors and assistants, as well as learning assistants, and also to ensure that the Institute is making optimal use of its resources, according to Knowles.
Students currently receive compensation equal to approximately $11,000 per year for their roles as RAs and RDs; beginning next year, however, they will instead be granted a $5,000 stipend—more than a 50 percent reduction—for doing the same amount of work.
While we are glad that the Residence Life professional staff has been up front with those applying for RA, RD, or LA positions in informing them of the changes in compensation, we believe the decrease in compensation is unfair, especially when the amount of work that students are required to do in the position is taken into consideration. When compared to the top 40 universities, only two peer institutions—Dartmouth College and Carnegie Mellon University—give less than RPI’s new stipend to their student residence life staff, placing the Institute in the bottom 8 percent.
We also question the reason behind this change, as it was independent of the budget cuts to address the financial crisis at RPI, according to the administration. While the Institute claims that one reason for the decrease is to make sure that no students are overcompensated, we believe that this situation is the exception rather than the rule, and should not be taken as into consideration as strongly.
Since it has been mentioned numerous times that students in need can request further funding from the financial aid office, we hope that students will at least take full advantage of this if they find themselves in a tight spot financially because of this change.
The student arm of the Residence Life staff serves an important role in the development of new students and upperclassmen who continue to live on campus, helping residents in a myriad of situations that arise; it is imperative that the administration recognize this and provide remuneration that is equitable to the work they do. We look forward to a better solution in future years and hope that this does not preclude students from taking positions on the residence life staff.
