College Residence Officer- Applicant Presentation

Have a read through the background situation described below. Please can you draft a report answering the question at the end and including any other comments that you think are relevant. In addition you will be required to present a short summary of your report to a panel of College Principals and the interview panel. You may wish to refer to the Accommodation website and Residents’ Handbook to assist you with this exercise

The presentation should be no more than 5 minutes in length and panel members may ask questions at the end. You will be asked to submit your written report at the end.

Background

A townhouse is occupied by 12 x students;the group are made up of the following:

  • they are all first year at Lancaster
  • 7 are Home/EU age 18
  • 2 are US students on the Study Abroad programme both age 20
  • 1 is 17 due to turn 18 at the end of November and from China
  • 1 is Indian age 18 and strict vegetarian
  • 1 is age 18 from Taiwan

8 of the students have a fairly laid back approach to their living environment; don’t expect to clean up after every meal, not too bothered about having a rota for everything but will do it when it looks like it needs doing.

4 of the students want a more organised approach to the communal areas; regular cleaning and rubbish removal rotas and they expect kitchen work surfaces to be clear when they want to cook.

Socially, at the beginning the group get on really well, some rotas are put in place, but by the end of October it becomes obvious that there are really only 4 of the group following the rotas with a couple of the others making small efforts and the rest not really bothering.

A couple of the students complain to the CRO.

The CRO organisesa kitchen meeting at the end of October, all students attend along with the Residence Officer and it ends amicably; there is an agreement that everyone will make more effort.

All is well for couple ofweeks but then things begin to slip back to how they were before.

Throughout this there have been some agreed ground rules in the kitchen with regard to use of fridges and workspace and kitchen equipment for the vegetarian student. In the middle of November he comes back after a weekend away to find that there has been a bit of a party for someone’s birthday;some of his kitchen equipment in the sink clearly has been used for meat preparation and some of his food appears to be missing from the fridge. He complains to the CRO on the Monday morning.

In addition a UPP technician happened to call to the building and reported to the CRO that quite a few stains and cigarette burns have appeared on the carpet in the living area, the smoke detector has balloons attached to it, the kitchen bin is overflowing and the stairway is littered with empty alcohol bottles and cans. The Porter advises the CRO that he responded to a noise complaint about the house over the weekend; there was loud music playing when he attended, it was turned down and there were no further complaints.

One of the overseas studentsfrom the house emails the Residence Officer to advise that he will be handing in his keys at the end of the week to go and live with friends in town because the University has not provided him with a suitable place to live and study.

Please identify the main issues that need to be addressed here. As a Residence Officer what steps could you take to resolve these issues and prevent further issues arising?