Talking Stick - March/April 2016 - 25

communication between those staff
members and the facilities on-call
staff is an imperative piece to the
customer service puzzle. Whether it
is the front desk staff or the resident
assistants who make the actual call,
these student staff must be able to
reliably determine what is or is not
considered an emergency and then
act accordingly (see sidebar). In many
ways, it is an extension of the training
they receive for resident management
in areas such as conflict resolution,
roommate mediation, or how to
control a situation.
Some campuses may provide
basic training for student and livein staff about first-aid responses to
facilities issues. However, because
the systems may be remotely located
or there is a potential risk to life or
property, generally the role of the
residence life staff is to manage the
residents and survey the scene. Drew
Jahr, assistant director of facilities and
operations at Texas Tech University in
Lubbock, indicates that his campus
"trains residence life staff to physically
put eyes on all problems." Once the
problem is addressed, the emergency
response begins with the first contact
call. During this conversation, it is
crucial for residence life staff to be clear
on the issue to the facilities staff and to
maintain continuous communication
until the situation is concluded. In
many cases, the responding residence
life staff stay on scene the entire time.
For more minor situations, once they
have recognized the situation and
called for assistance, they tend to leave
shortly after the facilities staff arrive.
However, the better customer service
approach is for the residence life staff
to remain long enough to gain an
understanding of the issue from the
facilities staff, so that the situation
and course of action can be easily
explained to the residents.

Should You Call?
When it comes to after-hour emergencies, it can be just as important to
not overreact to a situation as it is to not sell it short. To help student
and residence life staff determine the appropriate course of action, most
campuses prepare emergency maintenance guidelines and train staff to
understand them. The following is excerpted from the Southern Illinois
University-Edwards emergency maintenance guidelines.
The bottom line decision to call out a facilities staff member to perform
emergency maintenance will rest with the Residence Life staff member
on duty. Several factors will be taken into consideration by the Residence
Life staff member on duty that will determine the importance and
urgency of the specific problem arising after normal working hours, such
as:
1. If the problem is left unattended, will it create a health or safety
concern for the resident, organization or facility?
2. The willingness of the residents to be flexible and work with the
housing staff, realizing that some matters are not cost effective
to repair outside of the normal hours of the Housing Facilities
Management operation (7:00 AM - 3:30 PM).
3. The time frame as to how long the resident would be left without
a particular service (i.e., hot water heater that is not working on a
Saturday morning); this would probably require a call out of Housing
Facilities personnel. If these items are reported on a Sunday evening,
the repair could possibly wait until Monday.
Examples of scenarios that would require possible call out after normal
hours of operation would be:
A. Hot water heaters, depending upon whether water is leaking into
an apartment and cannot be turned off, the amount of time before
a normal working shift will occur, or the flexibility of the residents
residing in the apartment.
B. Water leaks that cannot be stopped and are creating damage to
personal and university property.
C. Door locking mechanisms that will not lock properly leaving the
resident without security mechanisms to prevent entry into living units.
D. Toilets that are backed up and causing stools to overflow.
E. Broken windows, when direct access is allowed to rooms, call the
painter to make the repair. If the painter is not available, call the
carpenter to board up the window.
F. Electrical problems, burning smell, sparks, or power outages in
apartments.
G. Elevators not working in University Housing during check in and check
out, or someone trapped in elevator or a physically challenged person
needing access to isolated areas.

Along with knowing when to
call, residence life staff must also

MARCH + APRIL 2016

25
Talking Stick - March/April 2016

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Talking Stick - March/April 2016
