What DSU Looks for in RAs and Senior RAs

Most of the people who keep DSU’s residence halls running are students. Behind every floor event, late-night lockout, and roommate agreement there is usually a Resident Assistant, and behind that RA is a Senior Resident Assistant and a Residence Hall Director. For anyone thinking about applying, here is what the job involves and what Residence Life seems to value in the people it hires.

Residence Life is based in the Courtyard Hall lobby and led by Nicolas Steilen, Director of Residence Life and Student Union. Its 2026-2027 handbook lays out a three-level team. Residence Hall Directors, or RHDs, are live-in professionals who manage each housing community and supervise student staff. Senior Resident Assistants are experienced student leaders who mentor RAs, handle administrative work, and help keep the halls safe. Resident Assistants are the ones residents see the most. Every community has its own RA, whose job is to build community, connect students to campus resources, plan events, and support safety.

RAs are on duty whenever the Residence Life office is closed, and each area, from Courtyard and Emry to the Residence Village and Van Eps(temporarily closed this semester), has its own duty phone. Lockouts, noise complaints, and the occasional fire alarm come through it. RAs also run social events for their floors, walk roommates through a roommate agreement in the first weeks of fall, and help with health and safety checks four times a year. SRAs work one level up, hosting educational programs with RHDs, including the First-Year Residential Experience for new students, and handling room change requests while supporting the RAs on their team.

The need for staff stays steady because of a state rule. Under South Dakota Board of Regents policy, students taking at least six on-campus credits have to live on campus for their first two years after high school. A single RHD oversees two first-year halls with about 250 students and eight RAs, or roughly 30 residents per RA.

So, who gets hired? There is no one-fits-all checklist, but there are some clues from how DSU talks about its own staff. In January 2026, Senior Resident Assistant Addison Nipper was named DSU’s Student Employee of the Month. His nominator, Madison Miller, pointed to his communication, his commitment to learning, and the way he was always first to step in, whether helping an RHD, advising an RA, or helping a first-year student settle in. She wrote that his reliability went “far beyond his job description.” Dependability, empathy, and being easy to talk to come up again and again in how the role is described.

As for perks, RA positions are paid mainly through housing and meals rather than an hourly wage. You can expect a free room and the DSU 145 meal plan. The job also builds experience in supervision, conflict resolution, and crisis response, and DSU RAs have taken that training off campus before, with two winning first place in a case study competition at the University of Northern Iowa’s RA conference in 2018.

On-campus jobs at DSU are posted on Handshake. Students interested in becoming an RA or SRA should watch for the opening there, talk to their own RA or RHD about what the work is really like, and stop by the Residence Life office in Courtyard Hall with questions.