The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 2 - 14

Rishi Sriram * Frank Shushok, Jr. * Laine Scales

Although at many institutions
student affairs administrators work
independently from faculty, there
is renewed interest on college
campuses to remove barriers
between the two groups to better
promote student outcomes.

affairs professionals craft co-curricular learning outcomes and thoughtfully plan programs
and services around designated student learning outcomes. In their critique of higher education, Arum and Roksa (2011) admonish
administrators for a lack of focus upon undergraduate education and a lack of interpersonal
contact with undergraduate students, but they
note an exception to this criticism with those
who work in student affairs. Quaye (2011)
writes, "I frequently tell the graduate students
I work with to use student affairs educator as
opposed to student affairs practitioner to emphasize the learning-centered focus of the work
we do" (p. 281). Student affairs professionals
are co-educators who partner with faculty to
foster greater synergy between the learning
that occurs in and out of the classroom.

Student-faculty interaction outside of the
classroom. Another constituency with the
potential to powerfully shape learning in the
residence halls is the faculty (Cook & Lewis,
2007). Faculty engagement refers to the level
of physical and psychological involvement
faculty have in the residential community.
Levels of involvement can range from one in14

vitation to speak in a residential environment,
to a partnership that includes recurring visits
throughout the semester or to daily living with
students in a formal leadership position (e.g.,
faculty-in-residence; Davenport & Pasque,
2014; Fitzpatrick, 2011). Faculty members are
key agents of integration of the in-class and
out-of-class lives of students (Kennedy, 2011).
In their study of almost 8,000 undergraduates, Fuentes et al. (2014) found that student
contact with faculty during the first year of
college led to greater faculty mentorship by the
senior year of college. Student-faculty interaction is important to students, and residential
environments are possible venues for fostering such interaction. Although at many institutions student affairs administrators work
independently from faculty, there is renewed
interest on college campuses to remove barriers between the two groups to better promote
student outcomes (Sriram, Shushok, Perkins,
& Scales, 2011).
The design of facilities. Facility design concerns attitudes toward the purpose of residential communities. Attitudes can range from
viewing residential environments as places that
only should provide food and shelter, to thinking that such environments should be state-ofthe-art entertainment facilities, to advocating
that these environments are extensions of the
classroom that facilitate deep learning in more
informal ways (see Shushok, Scales, Sriram,
& Kidd, 2011). As Riker and DeCoster (2008)
noted, "Within the residential community
students experience both a physical environment and an interpersonal or social environment, both of which communicate something
to them on a daily basis" (p. 81). Facilities influence student involvement and behavior in many

THE JOURNAL OF COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY STUDENT HOUSING

The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 43, No. 2

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