News > December 4, 2008

By Caitlin Brooks | Asst. news editor

Roommate conflicts, emotional distress, the pressures from college and home; when these problems become too much to handle, students are encouraged to seek the help and counsel of their Resident Advisers (RAs). When these issues are too much for even these capable employees of the Office of Residence Life and Housing (RL&H) to handle, the RA passes information on to his or her boss, a graduate student that lives in each residence hall known as the Graduate Hall Director. These students then move up the chain of command within RL&H to the Residence Life Coordinators. There are two of these powerful resources in RL&H, though not many people are aware of their existence until they are in need (Have an irreconcilable roommate conflict? Is that your second alcohol citation?), but Nicole Rodriguez-Pastor and Gavin Roark are always there, at the ready in times of crisis or just to chat.

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Together, Rodriguez-Pastor and Roark oversee all residence students in the community. Each presides directly over six graduate hall irectors; Rodriguez-Pastor in South Campus and Palmer, Piccolo and the Townhouses and Roark in North Campus.

Through these Hall Directors, they are in charge of some 50 RAs each and almost 2,000 students a piece. In addition, Rodriguez-Pastor advises the National Residence Hall Honorary, the only nationwide organization that exclusively recognizes leaders in the residence halls, and Roark advises the Resident Student Association, an organization dedicated to providing a student voice to RL&H.

Rodriguez-Pastor and Roark can be found Monday-Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in their offices located in Benson 101 and both live in university provided apartments located in their respective areas of campus; Rodriguez-Pastor in Luter and Roark in Kitchin.

Because both Rodriguez-Pastor and Roark are married, living in a residence hall proves a unique experience. “I feel like I’m more connected to student life because I live on campus, and I definitely have a lot more sympathy for students who complain about noise because I hear the same things they do,” Rodriguez-Pastor said. “It comes with its drawbacks, but it’s a great commute.”

Roark has lived in residence halls on college campuses continuously since the fall of 2000, and he enjoys his two bedroom apartment that he shares with his wife, Jacquelyn who he said, “really made it a home, with a little bit of help from me.”

Though the two counterparts share a lot in common, their paths to the positions as Residence Life Coordinators have been distinctly different.

Rodriguez-Pastor graduated with a Master’s in Communication in 2007 and wrote her final thesis on intercultural health communications. So how did she end up working in the Office of Residence Life and Housing as the Residence Life Coordinator for all of South Campus? Rodriguez-Pastor met her husband, Enrique Rodriguez, while they were finishing up their graduate work at the university. Rodriguez, a 2008 alumnus of the counseling graduate program, was a Graduate Hall Director at the university. Rodriguez-Pastor said she thought “Quique,” as she affectionately calls her husband, was doing work she would be interested in and, upon completion of her masters, “sorta fell into the position.” Rodriguez-Pastor worked as a resident advisor for one year and a hall director for two years in a summer program called Upward Bound.

When she started working full time for the university Aug. 1, 2007, just three months after graduation, the program was her only real experience in housing.

“I took the job because I really enjoy working with students. I love Wake Forest, and so it just made a lot of sense to be here. I was even a little unclear what exactly my job was on the first day that I came in. I just kinda hit the ground running,” she said.

Rodriguez-Pastor takes life as it comes and it is her adventurous personality that led her not only to take on a position of authority almost on a whim, but that makes for fascinating stories which she enjoys relating to the Resident Advisor class, CSN 353: College Student Development, which she teaches for new resident advisors. To the question, “What did you do this weekend, Nicole?” her students receive such responses as “skydiving for my father’s 50th birthday” or “Oh, I got Lasik last weekend.”

During her college years, Rodriguez-Pastor traveled to Costa Rica where she was watching a bull fight that was open to the public. “I was like, why not? I’m in Costa Rica, let’s get into a bull fight,” she said. She and a female friend joined the throng of young Costa Rican men in the ring with the bull and while she claims she spend most of the fight hiding scared in the corner, “I did end up standing in the middle of the ring, waving the red flag. That was pretty scary,” she said. This devil-may-cry attitude fits her job perfectly, Rodriguez-Pastor said. Anyone willing to take responsibility for half a university campus would “have to be a little crazy. I think the types of people who are attracted to the job are the sort that enjoy people, enjoy students and have such high energy. You have to really care about this job,” she said.

Roark pursued a career path geared specifically to working in college RL&H offices. He graduated from Austin Peay State University in 2004 with a degree in Corporate Communications and received his masters from Mississippi State University in Counselor Education in May 2006. He joined the RL&H staff in June 2006.

Throughout his college career, Roark was actively involved in Residence Life affairs. He was a student leader and involved in Greek Life and Student Government. He became an Undergraduate Hall Director his junior year at Austin Peay and realized that a career in Residence Life was for him. From there, he attended Mississippi State for free while pursuing his masters and co-taught a RA class, a task he still enjoys at the university. Roark was attracted to the university because of the high percent of students who chose to live on campus, as well as the connection between Greek Life and Residence Life, which are two organization that Roark feels need to work together in order to make things happen on campus.

Roark finds the personal interaction with students to be the most rewarding aspect of his life with RL&H, especially his work with the Resident Student Association. “I see this as a challenge and support opportunity,” he said, referring to Sanford’s Challenge and Support Theory that he studied during his graduate program. “We get to challenge them (resident students and RAs) to raise the bar, but also to support them in times of need,” Roark said.

Roark greatly enjoys what he called “road tripping” with students on the way to or from training sessions or conferences for the Resident Student Association. “You really get to see what students are thinking and what drew them to Wake Forest University. The stories I hear on those trips that help me get a much better idea of what students are like,” he said.

So what does Roark do when he’s not helping residents and their RAs and Graduate Hall Directors deal with the day to day trials of university life? He plays golf. “I am a big time golfer and will play in just about any weather, with anyone. Seriously, if a student were to ask to play golf with me, I’d love to,” he said.

“I also went bungee jumping in Cancun; I have it on tape,” he added, not to be outdone by Rodriguez-Pastor.

The hardest part of their job, the Residence Life Coordinators agreed, has to be discipline. “People just need to understand that there are policies in place and you have to follow them, and it’s not something people are going to like you for. It’s part of my job; an important part,” Rodriguez-Pastor said.

Roark mirrored her sentiments. “I really want the students and RA staff to know that I am here for them, but part of the job comes with discipline,” Roark said. “I just hope that I can turn it into a learning experience for students. I need them to know that the mistake they make in the residence hall could get them arrested in the real world, and then they won’t be dealing with me or Nicole; they will be dealing with the police.”

“The mistakes we make are never so paramount that they can’t be redirected or learned from,” Roark said.