More scrambling is in order for the department of residence life as two more resident assistants have resigned from their positions, making a grand total of nine staff changes this year.
Vicki Lizardi ’05 and Burim Gjidija ’05, both resident assistants in Dolan Hall, resigned last week citing medical reasons, according to residence life staff.
“The two that left were fantastic RAs and it was in their best interest of medical reasons to leave,” said Laura Cantrall, associate director of residence life.
“I support them in their decisions and it was a very hard decision to make,” she added.
They are the eighth and ninth staff terminations in a rash of residence life problems this year. Even before the school year began, residence life lost an RA, Steve Tyburski ’06 who quit while still in training.
Clark Callaghan, the former RHC of Regis, was forced to resign after being caught away from campus while on duty, a breach of conduct among residence life staff.
He is currently working as a graduate assistant in University College.
Rebecca Robinson ’05 and Kevin Saville ’06 were fired and forced to resign, respectively, after an incident involving alcohol occured in Robinson’s room before the Inaugaral Ball, according to residence life staff. That same incident prompted additional sanctions against seven other resident assistants.
Joe King ’05, Larry Robinson ’07 and Christa Szantyr ’05 also resigned for personal reasons earlier this semester.
“It’s been a very different year in terms of staff this year,” said Fran Koerting, director of residence life. “It is unusual for so many to happen in one year.”
“The decisions and resignations were all done for personal, private reasons and every reason was as different as the individuals,” she said. “The two resignations were not related to morale or disagreements in the department.”
The high number of resignations has prompted several changes in residence life, including being able to go abroad, intern or student teach one semester and be an RA the other in a given school year.
Another unusual move made when a Freshman was assigned to fill the vacancy left by Gjidija. Freshmen generally are not allowed to be resident assistants until they have one year of living in the residence halls under their belt, but sometimes desperate times call for desperate measures.
Evan Barden ’08 is the new resident assistant on the first floor of Dolan Hall East.
“I was asked to join the staff last Wednesday or Thursday and I had the weekend to think it over which was nice,” said Barden. “Tuesday is the dorm meeting to announce the changes and everything starts after that.”
Barden currently lives on the fourth floor in Dolan and will remain there.
Kevin Donahue ’07 will be moving to and covering the fourth floor, formerly Gjidija’s floor and Barden will cover Donahue’s old floor, the first floor, according to some Dolan residents.
“I think it’s a good opportunity to use someone who is going to continue there anyways and is already there rather than have another RA come from another building or floor just to do rounds,” Barden added.
He is not worried about acclimating to his job and is looking forward to starting.
“I don’t think it will be too hard to adjust to the new job and I look forward to getting the experience,” he said.
Dolan Hall has lost three out of five RAs this year, but students seem unaffected by the process.
“I have seen Kevin Donahue moving out and I feel sorry he has to keep moving his bags all around,” said Skip Russell ’07. “But its been a pretty easy process for me as a student.”
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