CUW’s Residence Life has strived to make on campus living a great experience for students, and this year they have taken their goal to another level.

Residence Life has implemented new protocols that they feel will make students across campus more comfortable. These improvements include, better roommate agreements, safety checks, and making staff more relational, rather than administrative.

One of the biggest improvements are the updated roommate agreements.

“This year we wanted to make sure that our residents took the roommate agreement more seriously, and treated it like a contract. We added things such as scheduled hang out times, quiet hour times, and roommate expectations, that we feel will help the roommates become acclimated with each other faster, and possibly become friends,” said Resident Director Manda Kelly.

The next protocol is actually new to Residence Life as a whole. This new protocol is called safety checks.  The idea of safety checks, allows RAs to get into their residents’ rooms to check for any maintenance concerns that need to be addressed immediately. Safety checks also allow RAs to talk with their residents and build relationships.

“The main goal of safety checks is, for the RAs to address maintenance concerns and to build relationships with their residents by getting a chance to talk to them. We feel that it is important for students to build relationships with each other, and safety checks allow for the RA and their residents to connect,” said Kelly.

The last change Residence Life made to improve student life is with their staff.

“Often times in the past, we feel that the students think we are here to police them or manage them, and that is not the case. This year we have trained our RAs to be more relational and friendly with their residents, rather than administrative. We have instructed our RAs to build relationships with their residents, and to leave policing to Campus Safety or the Conduct Board,” said Kelly.

CUW Residence Life feels these improvements will make student life better as whole, but they also recognize that they still have room to improve.

With a new school year starting at CUW, so to has a new position. The Faith Associate is a student-held position within the residence hall of Wittenberg that provides spiritual resources for new students.

“The Faith Associate is a bridge between Campus Ministry and Residence Life”, said Campus Ministry Faculty advisor, Nichole Haas.

Faith Associates in Wittenberg enable new students with a fellow student who they can seek out when they need help with getting acclimated with college or someone to talk to.

In addition, Faith Associates will have monthly critical conversations where they will answer difficult questions students might have for them.

“Faith Associates work closely with RAs. Their main focus is creating and supporting a Christian atmosphere among the hall”, Haas said.

The Faith Associate position is because of combined efforts of both Campus Ministry and Residence Life. During the Fall semester of 2016, a survey asked students  about spiritual life on campus. The surveys showed that most students on campus go to their peers when they have questions regarding faith. This resulted in the Faith Associate position.

The position  is a pilot program on campus and only available in Wittenberg. Placing the first Faith Associates in Wittenberg allows the university to evaluate in an environment that is majority composed of freshman.  Depending on the degree of success, Faith Associates could expand to other campus residence halls, which would allow more students to utilize the resources.

Haas also oversees the hiring process of the Faith Associates and anyone interested in becoming a faith associate can get more information by contacting the CMLT office or stopping by in upper Albrecht in the CMLT office.

Two weeks ago, Concordia brimmed with activity as hundreds of freshman and transfer students moved onto campus to take part in the New Student Orientation.

Orientation is always an important factor in acclimating new students to campus resources and preparing them for the first week of classes. Although the orientation process changes from year to year, the goal remains the same: to make every student feel comfortable and at home on campus.

According to the Coordinator of Student Activities and Orientation Devan Lenz, about 500 students participated this year. This includes about 400 students at each activity throughout orientation weekend.

“We need to integrate students socially and academically. Our goal is to connect them with people on campus. We want to connect them with upperclassmen and to their fellow underclassmen as well as faculty,” Lenz said.

Lenz also said that orientation is structured to connect new students to campus resources such as Campus Safety, the Counseling Center, the Learning Resource Center and many more.

This year, orientation added new features to further connect students to the Concordia community. One feature consisted of putting new students into small groups led by a member of the orientation team. The leaders of these groups helped new students find their around campus and other tasks like teaching them how to do laundry.

“These small groups created such a strong sense of community. Not only did it increase our attendance at a lot of our events but it also made the new students feel like they were a part of a team,” Lenz said.

Orientation activities include informational gatherings and fun activities like Skit Night where students can learn more about the residence halls and staffs on campus.

New students will continue getting integrated to Concordia throughout the Fall Semester with periodical check ins with their orientation leaders and the upcoming “Falcon Frenzy.”