ODU Achievement System:Housing & Residence LifeBy: Cassie Heinselman

HOUSING & RESIDENCE LIFE MISSION

“Housing and Residence Life is committed to supporting the mission of the University by striving to provide safe and well-maintained communities that enhance the overall collegiate experience. Through the responsible stewardship of resources – personnel, physical, and financial – we offer a living and learning experience that facilitates students’ development as Monarchs and growth as global citizens.”

Housing & Residence Life strives to provide students with a clean, safe community that will enhance the college experience and give students access to many opportunities provided on ODU’s campus.

 

WHAT INCOMING FRESHMEN SHOULD KNOW

Housing & Residence Life strives to teach incoming freshman the rules and regulations of on-campus housing along with resources around campus to help students academically, when and where sporting and other events are taking place, and about a new campaign called the Monarch Resident Citizen Campaign

How Freshmen Learn About This

Housing & Residence Life currently teaches freshman through Orientation and floor meetings throughout the

 

academic year. The office of Housing & Residence Life is having a hard time reaching out to students because neither of their methods of teaching students is mandatory. Students can choose whether or not they want to go to the information session about Housing & Residence Life or if they would rather go to an information session about something else, such as financial aid or study abroad. Much like Orientation, floor meetings are not mandatory. Students can choose not to attend a floor meeting all year and will have no consequences. Another flaw in the system is that many freshmen live off campus. Students that live off campus are not told when floor meetings are and, therefore, do not ever attend them. Even students that live off campus should be required to attend floor meetings because the likelihood of them spending time in a dorm, whether it be to hang out with friends or to complete a group project, is very high.

 

CHALLENGES

Level 1

Your new friend that lives down the hall from you wants to know all of the rules and regulations of Housing & Residence Life, but he has a class during the floor meeting. Attend the meeting and make a list of the rules and regulations for your new friend and post it on your profile.

Alternate for those living off campus: Your first day of class, you made friends with an awesome guy that lives on campus. You asked him if he wanted to hang out, and he agreed to, but he has a floor meeting. Attend the floor meeting and see if

 

you can find him there so you can hang out with him when it is over and you can learn the rules and regulations of Housing & Residence Life for when you spend time in his dorm.

Level 2

You and your friend are walking down the hall of one of the dorms on campus. You notice the poster displaying the Monarch Resident Citizen of the month. You tell your friend that you know the person and they don’t believe you. Scan the QR code on the poster, find the one of the Monarch Resident Citizens of the Month, take a selfie with him or her, and upload it onto your profile. Now your friend will have to believe you.

Level 3

Your mom thinks that you are slacking off in school. She has threatened to shut your phone off in two hours if you don’t prove that you’ve been trying to improve your grades. All that she has been talking about lately is how great the students are that have been receiving the Monarch Resident Citizen of the month campaign. To save your social life, find the posters of the Monarch Resident Citizens of the

 

Month and take selfies with three of them and upload them onto your profile. You only have two hours until your mom shuts your phone off, so make it fast!

Option 2:

Your mom hates the friends that you’ve been hanging out with and thinks they are a bad influence on you. She has threatened to shut off your phone in two hours so you can no longer contact your deadbeat friends. To prove that your friends are not a bad influence, you and your three friends must take selfies with all of the Monarch Citizens of the Month and upload the pictures onto your profiles. You only have your phone for two more hours, so make it fast!

Follow Up

You have a friend that does so much for the community, but is never recognized for any of it. You’re tired of him or her not gaining anything from the hard work that he or she does. Nominate this friend for Monarch Resident Citizen of the Month.

 

HOW PLAYERS WILL COMPLETE THE CHALLENGES

 

Players will download the app and create a profile in which there will be several information sections that will need to be filled out so that challenges can be given to players that can actually complete them.

Players will be walked through the app and will learn the ins and outs of the game.

Challenges will pop up on the challenge board (much like the news feed section on Facebook).

When players find a challenge that they would like to complete, they will click on the challenge and press accept. If the challenge requires multiple people to be completed, players can accept the challenge, then they will be paired with other players who have also accepted the challenge and may begin. If the challenge has a time limit, it will begin when the challenge has been accepted.

Upon completing a challenge, players may receive a follow up challenge. Just like any other challenge, players can accept or decline the challenge.

The follow up challenge will pop up on the app right after completion of the challenge that it relates to.

 

Players must either accept or decline the challenge before they can do anything else on the app.

For the challenges for levels two and three, players must find the posters of the Monarch Resident Citizens of the month and scan the QR code on the posters. This will give them a drop pin on their GPS as to where the Monarch Resident Citizens of the month are located.

 

HOW PLAYERS WILL BE ASSESSED ON THEIR COMPLETION OFCHALLENGES

Level 1

Players must accept the challenge when they are at their floor meeting in the residence hall. A time stamp and a GPS locator will prove that they have completed the challenge.

Level 2 & 3

Game Masters will check the photos that are uploaded to verify that the pictures are actually with the Monarch Resident Citizens of the Month.

Follow Up Challenge

 

Nominations are submitted through Orgsync, therefore the game app can be connected to Orgsync and can verify that a nomination was submitted.

HOW WILL THESE CHALLENGES HELP FRESHMEN LEARN ABOUT HOUSING & RESIDENCE LIFE?

Level 1

Students that live on campus will have to attend the meeting and will be informed on the policies and procedures of Housing and Residence Life

Students that live off campus will likely spend time in on campus housing, whether it be hanging out with friends or working on a project. All students need to know the Housing and Residence Life policies and Procedures

Level 2

 

Students will learn about the Monarch Residence Citizen Campaign and will make connections with a student that has been contributing to the community

Students may want to be recognized as that Monarch Residence Citizen of the Month and will strive to follow the rules and excel in their community involvement.

Level 3

Students will learn about the Monarch Residence Citizen Campaign and will make connections with a student that has been contributing to the community.

Students that complete option two will make connections with other freshman.

Students and will be exposed to more successful members of the ODU community.

Follow Up

Students will learn exactly what it takes to become a Monarch Resident Citizen of the month and will learn how to nominate someone for it.

 

Students will also be forced to think critically about what it means to be a Monarch Resident Citizen of the month because they will have to think of someone to nominate.

HOW TO ASSESS IF THE CHALLENGES WERE SUCCESSFUL

Surveys can be sent out to students that play the game and students that do not play the game asking questions such as “How much do you think you know about Housing & Residence Life” or “How many floor meetings did you attend this semester”.

Another way to assess the impact of the challenges on the players is to see if any of the players become the Monarch Resident Citizen of the month.

 

The home page of the app can be set up to ask questions about Housing & Residence Life policies and procedures that players can answer for bonus points. This will assess how much the players know about and have learned about the Housing & Residence Life rules and regulations.