The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 44, No. 1 - 96

Kathleen Buell * Vaughn Love * Christina Yao

a general focus on engineering to a narrower
focus on the intersections between engineering and the world of athletics and human performance in order to better suit the interests
and scholarship of the faculty sponsor. This
shift has increased buy-in and excitement for
the sponsor, furthering the strong relationship between LCs and the UNL College of
Engineering.
In order to address the needs of faculty
and continue to provide quality support to students, LLPs can look to campus partners in
other student affairs departments or encourage faculty to collaborate with each other for
additional personnel support for a single LLP.
Although created 20 years ago, Zeller's (1994)
description of WSU's residential learning
communities provides some direction in this
area. The RLCs Zeller (1994) highlighted were

Participation in LLPs was
beneficial for first-generation
students in easing their social and
academic transition to college,
with the successful transition
attributed to strong academic
and curricular environments,
interactions with faculty and
peers, and positive student
perceptions of the campus and
residence hall climates .
96

projects supported by multiple offices beyond
residence life and academic departments, including technology offices and academic advising. LLPs should consider other student affairs
offices, like advising, student government, or
campus recreation, as partners in service of
LLPs and their objectives for students.
One critical component of LLP success is
the interest and investment of participating
students. Popular culture-the films, novels,
television programs, and music that permeate the collective Zeitgeist-can be useful in
attracting students to a program, and creating
opportunities to connect popular culture with
learning may be a successful future direction
for LLPs. Because of popular culture's ubiquity, Tisdell (2007) argues that it can be an effective educational tool that provides context and
practical applications for otherwise complex
theories. For example, zombies have recently
permeated movies, television, and other forms
of media and have increased societal interest
in surviving a zombie apocalypse. LLP staff
could capitalize on this interest by offering an
interdisciplinary LLP that draws upon the interests of film and media studies, as well as the
biology department (biology of epidemics) and
sociology or social work (human responses
to disasters). By engaging with an academic
topic through a popular culture perspective,
LLPs could provide an exciting and unique opportunity for involvement for students from
multiple academic disciplines and offer an opportunity for innovative collaboration between
multiple campus departments including interdisciplinary collaboration between faculty. Encouraging multiple faculty members to work
together on an interdisciplinary effort would
be a tremendous benefit for students, par-

T h e J o u r n a l o f C o l l e g e a n d U n i v e r s i t y St u d e n t H o u s i n g
The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 44, No. 1

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