Not So Restful Night

[tenshikurai9]

Tuesday night and nearing ten, a male staff member knocks on my room mate's and my door.  Apparently all the beds in the dorm have to be placed the same way and we have to move the beds.  He then proceeds to stand there.  I ask him if he needs to watch us and my room mate makes a statement that she does not want him to be an unattended male staff member standing in her room.  His response to her is to say, "The door's open." 

She ends-up being the one to call the female R.A. to our room.  During the male's and her argument, she tells him if he doesn't get out of her room by the count of ten, she's going to call her mother.  His response is to count to 10, skipping numbers. 

Eventually it gets settled that the R.A. will take over and he leaves. 
---
Wednesday after the training day, the room mate and myself go ask for advice from the CSIO (Center Standards and Incentives Officer.)  He has us go to the Community Living Director. 

The good news is that she says she'll arrange a mediation and the other good news is that she's not going to be the third party.  Here's why I'm glad she isn't going to be the third party. 

As the room mate is telling of her past conflicts with the guy and what happened, the Director in question says comments like how the dorms have been under better control since he got there; nevermind that doesn't change the fact that we just had a negative incident with him.  She says a bit about his position and how it requires him to be in the dorms sometimes; nevermind that he didn't address my room mate's concern that he was unattended which immediately escalated the situation and made me feel threatened.  How my room mate needs to check her temper and respect him; nevermind I don't see how my room mate is expected to hold esteem for the guy when she doesn't see anything to have esteem for in him. 

The Director asks me if I've ever had conflict with him in the past and the answer ends-up no, but the incident showed me bad of him. 

Somehow the director ventured a comment that I may have issues with males and maybe I could talk to someone about them.  Some of my closest friends are males.  (Hi hellsop.) 

So now I'm waiting for this mediation to happen. 

Comments

[arkivarie.livejournal.com]

That guy was definitely out-of-line! Sounds like he gets a cheap kick from petty bullying and therefore shouldn't be in any type of work where people skills are important.

[hellsop.livejournal.com]

Dude doesn't need to be in the room to watch someone move beds. He can come back in 10 minutes or something.

This kind of control behavior is pretty common in people that don't quite get what their role in an educational facility is. They are not corrections officers. They are not drill sergeants. They are not baby-sitters. They are there only to see that rules are followed, and minorly to help some folks turn into responsible adults. That necessarily includes treating as responsible those that can evidence responsibility and giving all the opportunity to do so.

[marmota.livejournal.com]

My two cents which I mentioned to you elsewhere is to remember your retail experiences with management. Your room mate and yourself should each put together a formal letter summarizing your sides of what happened, and send a copy to all of the parties involved. Otherwise it turns into a game of he-said-she-said, and it's entirely possible that there will be or are now people involved who have only heard what happened from and through other people.

I can sort of see where he was coming from. I'm sure there are students there prone to knee-jerk rebelliousness and belligerence, and he probably had a not entirely unreasonable assumption given likely past experiences with those other students that you two were just blowing him off about moving the beds. So, another strike against him is in not taking the time or caring enough to understand that each student is different... still, even thinking that way, getting someone female to watch instead of him or with him after being told he was making you both uncomfortable was a major screwup. Sounds like the staff could use a non-harassment seminar. In my opinion it's a no-brainer for someone working in a coed dorm* to immediately pick up on what your room mate was requesting and why they were asking it.


and if it *isn't* coed, then the organization is seriously screwing up just by putting that guy in this situation without sufficient training.

[tenshikurai9.livejournal.com]

He didn't even give us a chance to blow him off. The dorm is a female dorm.

[mattp.livejournal.com]

my room mate needs to [...] respect him
Respect, like trust, is earned, not given away.

Somehow the director ventured a comment that I may have issues with males and maybe I could talk to someone about them.
And that bit certainly sounds like he's not taking your complaint seriously. If there's an appropriate point in the mediation, it might be worthwhile raising this.

I hope it goes well.

[tenshikurai9.livejournal.com]

Shiiit. . .You are behind.

I've since gone to my 2nd center for more training and my Westover room mate completed and left the Thursday before the Tuesday I left. Which was barely over two weeks before I had to go-on summer break.