October 2003 Newsletter

October Newsletter Content:

• Feature Article - "Can I Kiss You?" ~ Sexual Assault Education in Residence Life
• New price for Inspiration for RAs & New RA Poster!
• Student Issues calendar for October
• RA Spotlight... This Month's Prize Winner!

PLEASE FORWARD THIS TO THE OTHER MEMBERS OF YOUR STAFF SO THEY CAN SUBSCRIBE AS WELL!

Mark your calendars! Start planning now for the annual "Residence Hall Student Staff Recognition Day!" It's the 3rd Wednesday of every February (February 18 this year).

"Can I Kiss You?"

"Can I Kiss You?" ~ Do your students ask? How about You?
Sexual Assault Education in Residence Life
By Mike Domitrz

As a RA, one of the most difficult situations you can ever face is having one of your residents being sexually assaulted or having a resident being accused of sexual assault. Can you prevent sexual assault from completely happening on your campus or in your residence? No. For this reason, you should refer to all sexual assault education as sexual assault awareness ~ not sexual assault prevention. Through unique programming and open discussions, you CAN help reduce the risk of a sexual assault occurring.

Making a Difference Begins with Being "Different"
To make a difference, you need to create a plan that is truly different. "No Means No", self-defense, and role playing scenes of college students sexually assaulting each other at college parties after drinking. Sound familiar? These common approaches to sexual assault awareness on campus are just that ~ common! Many students experience these three approaches starting in middle school and high school. By the time they are in college, the majority of students are not listening anymore.

Do not misunderstand me. "No means No" is a very important message. Learning self-defense provides you with one more valuable option to defend yourself or to potentially avoid dangerous situations. Understanding the importance of how alcohol and drug consumption affects the occurrences of sexual assault is vital to students. At the same time, none of these three approaches tackle the core issue of sexual assault ~ getting consent! "No Means No" addresses being denied consent, but does not teach HOW to obtain consent. To learn the "HOW" and to be best prepared for discussing sexual assault awareness, purchase a book on healthy dating and sexual assault that will provide you with in-depth exercises to utilize with your residents. Teaching the "wrong" approach can be devastating to sexual assault victims and survivors.

Are You a Follower or a Leader?
As a RA, your residents are constantly watching your every move and remembering each word you say. Even when you feel like no one is listening, they are. How do you talk about dating, "hooking up", and intimacy? If a resident returns from a date telling everyone how he/she got drunk and then "hooked up" with someone at the party, what do you say? Do you say anything at all? Silence is a powerful statement.

Yes, speaking out at a moment like the one described above can be awkward and uncomfortable. However, caring leadership is not easy. You were chosen to be a RA for your strength and leadership. How will you lead your residents toward more respectful dating and intimacy belief systems? You can begin the process by educating yourself. Work with sexual assault professionals from your campus and the local community. Invite national experts to help motivate and educate your students.

Provide a handout that has all the campus and community resources available for sexual assault victims and survivors. Read the entire handout with your residents as a group (otherwise, few will do so on their own). Request for each person to keep the handout in an accessible location inside their room (drawer or tackboard). If you would like more resources, visit www.canikissyou.com and click into the "Colleges & Universities" section of the website. The more you empower victims and survivors to speak out, the safer your campus becomes!

Are you done now? No. You have only begun. Changing negative behaviors and disrespectful belief systems takes time. Your students are inundated on a daily basis with images on TV and are pressured by their friends to forget what you are trying to teach them. Schedule periodic programming that reinforces the message of respect and care. Throughout the year, you can do the following:

• Conduct a Panel Discussion: invite a campus sexual assault counselor, a campus police officer, and sexual assault nurse examiner, and a sexual assault survivor to sit on an "open forum" talk.
• Bring an interactive expert to campus! Professional speakers who are successful in the college market are known for having unique approaches that inspire students with new outlooks. By working with multiple campus departments and organizations, you won't need all of the funding to come out of your budget. An engaging, fun, and thought-provoking speaker can inspire males and females to make significant changes in their lives and across your campus.
• Have a "Movie Night" with a film that addresses sexual assault.
• Highly encourage students to participate in "Take Back the Night" on your campus.
• Schedule a Self-Defense Program in Your Residence (While not the entire solution, self-defense is always a great option to utilize). RAD is the most commonly used self-defense program on college campuses. Contact your campus police/security for more information.
• What can you think of?

You have a wonderful opportunity to make a powerful difference in the lives of your students. Once you teach them how to both live with and expect respect, they will look to you for guidance. They will listen closely to how you talk about your own dating life and sexual experiences. Now there is only one question left. Will you ask, "Can I Kiss You?"

Mike Domitrz, sexual assault awareness expert and critically-acclaimed author, travels the country speaking on college campuses with his popular 'Can I Kiss You? Dating, Communication, Respect, & Sexual Assault Awareness' program for students. Known for his creative approach to healthy dating and sexual assault awareness, Domitrz combines a powerful balance of humor and hard-hitting emotion. By engaging audiences in an open debate, he builds a comfortable and honest atmosphere for both males and females to make life-changing decisions. In addition to residence life professionals bringing Mike to speak, he frequently works with Campus Activities, Greek Life, Women's Studies, Athletics, and Orientation Programming. To learn more or to bring Mike to your campus, visit www.canikissyou.com

For more exercises to utilize as a RA, purchase the book residence life professionals across the country and in Canada are raving about ~ May I Kiss You? A Candid Look at Dating, Communication, Respect, and Sexual Assault Awareness by Mike Domitrz at www.mayikissyoubook.com

Added this month is the first of the new online inservices. This one is entitled "It's About Time," and will help you with your time management skills!

Here are a few of the features:

Over 100 bulletin board downloads! - Save HOURS on your bulletin boards and increase the quality of your passive programming!

Advertising Resources - All of the premium programs include advertisements you can download, edit and print out. In addition, you will find templates for flyers, mailbox inserts, table tents, and more.

Games, Icebreakers, Teambuilders

Whether you need ideas for your staff meetings, your floor meetings, a retreat, or other purpose, you will find them here:

52 High Energy Games
37 Icebreakers
27 Low Energy Games
17 Problem Solving Activities
29 Teambuilding Activities
Bonus section... 37 ADDITIONAL Games and activities, plus links to other sites
(These numbers will grow as the site grows)

Doortags & Themes

Resident Communication

Custom Websites!

• YOU.ResidentAssistant.com! - Create your own ResidentAssistant.com website! No html knowledge necessary! It's a great way to keep in touch with your residents! Post important dates, information, and resources online!

Programming calendars, including student concerns during that month, programming ideas, holidays, themes, and more!

Resource Document Templates, Flyers, and Signs

To sign up and get more information, go to /archive/premiumservice/

While there are already a lot of great resources, the service is still growing!

You will be notified weekly with new additions to the site, and will be able to request special content and programs. More info...

New Inspiration for RAs Price & New Poster!

New price on Inspiration Books! After running a sale last month on a case of Inspiration for RAs books, I received great feedback, so I've decided to leave the price for these books at $10 per book for visitors of ResidentAssistant.com. The retail price (in your campus bookstore and on Amazon.com) is $14.95, so this is a great value.

Be sure to also check out Inspiration for Student Leaders, Inspiration for LGBT Students and their Allies, and Inspiration for Greeks at the ResidentAssistant.com bookstore.

New Poster! This poster, with "Hopes of an RA," an excerpt from Inspiration for RAs is now available!

Student Issues Calendar

These are some issues students may face during this time of year. This information can be useful to not only be aware of what students may be going through, but also to plan relevant programs.

Each of the following issues should spark programming ideas in your head. For example, to address "Graduate School Syndrome" (see below), you might want to bring in someone from the career center to talk about steps to prepare for the application process and GRE/MCAT/LSAT prep.

October

• Academic stress from midterms builds with the great demand for studying and preparation. For some students this may be their first exam of the semester. For many, the midterm workload pressures are followed by feelings of failure and loss of self-esteem.
• Roommate problems continue, but they are smaller in scope than previous months.
• Values exploration continuing, especially in the area of sexuality.
• Dating/non-dating/friendship anxieties extremely high. Non-dating students feel a sense of loss of esteem because so much value is placed upon dating. For women who do date, the pressure to perform sexually increases and consequently increases feelings of rejection, loneliness and guilt and in some instances leads to unwanted pregnancies.
• Homesickness may be still felt by a number of students.
• Job panic for mid-year graduates starts with the onset of resume preparation and interviewing.
• Students decide to withdraw from school because they either realize that college is not the place for them, they return home for personal reasons or they transfer to another school.
• Grief from not being part of a group develops because of inadequate skills for finding a group, or from not being selected by one.
• Financial strain sets in from lack of budgeting experience.
• Homecoming blues develop because of no date for social affairs, and/or lack of ability/opportunity to participate in activities.
• Graduate school syndrome starts to emerge from graduating seniors. Signing up for graduate school exams, wondering if you will be accepted, wondering which school to apply to and questioning whether graduate school is the right thing to do.
• Time conflicts between academic and social expectation emerges.
• Signing up for classes involves starting to think about he following semester
  Adjusting to new study habits includes not just being able to study the way they did in high school. More time and greater workload needs to be incorporated into their schedule for studying.
• Disenchantment with school - low reward level because student begins to realize that life at college is not as perfect as they were led to believe by parents, teachers and counselors. Old problems seem to continue and new ones are added. An external reality they had put heir hopes in has failed them.

For a detailed calendar resource, including holidays, theme weeks and months, programming ideas and more, check out ResidentAssistant.com .

RA Spotlight

This month's winner of the new Programming Submission contest is Adrienne M from Valley Forge Christian College in Phoenixville, PA.

Adrienne submitted a program called "Bigger and Better Scavenger Hunt," which can be found in the ResidentAssistant.com members area. Along with a great program description and instructional information, Adrienne submitted 4 flyers, to be posted over the span of 4 weeks leading up to the program.

Congratulations Adrienne!

If you want to enter to win, all you need to do is submit a program or bulletin board with an attachment or attachments such as flyers or other materials. To enter, go to: /archive/contest/ (You don't have to be an RA to enter) Current members will get a book and another membership to give away, or a year added on to their current membership.

If you have suggestions for this newsletter, or would be interested in providing content, please email me at [email removed]