So what does an RD do? Well, the picture to the left is a brief snapshot of a day in the life. This past Saturday the RD's in the apartments hosted Thanksgiving Dinner for our residents. We had about 150 students show up so thank goodness we made 5 Turkeys. I just want to say thank you to my mom for cooking Thanksgiving dinner all these years. It's no easy task, and carving a turkey is no easy thing either. Those things are hot, greasy, and hot....
Brian(another RD) and I went shopping Friday night and joked around about what it means to work in Student Development. In every job description for Student Development you will always see the following words, "any other tasks or responsibilities given to you by the Dean of Students and/or other supervisors".
This means that you will become good at random things. This list includes but are not limited too;
1. Buying massive amounts of food from Wal-Mart or Sam's Club
2. Trying to guesstimate how many students will show up for an event.
3. Carrying massive amounts of food and drinks into cramp spaces, in severe whether conditions.
4. Going to meetings with a smile...sometimes.
5. Setting up and cleaning up for events.
6. Closing off the month of August for some type of training, Orientation, or welcome week.
7. Grabbing "coffee" to catch up with students, co-workers and friends.

A list of things that I never thought I'd be doing for my last 2 jobs.
1. Cutting wood posts in a shirt and tie with a hacksaw.
2. Dressing up in 80's clothes while rollerskating with students till 3am.
3. Apologizing to Aquarium authorities for near deaths to fish, turtles and other exotic marine creatures.
4. Defrosting 5 turkeys in my bathtub and cutting 10 onions the next morning.
5. Taking multiple trips on a bus or in a van to and from the airport at ungodly hours.
6. Making students do stupid games that I created in college for Rec Classes, for bonding purposes.
7. Convincing people that I am not a student, but a worker at the college....Do I really look that young?
8. Hearing, an improve skit quoted to me EVERYDAY...."I'm Scott Hwang, you don't even know!" is so dead to me, but the students here don't realize it.

Back from NCMSLC

This past weekend I attended the National Christian Multi-Cultural Student Leadership Conference. I along with 3 other staff members and some 50 plus students made the trip to Eastern University near Philadelphia, PA. As soon as we arrived the students received a lecture from Tony Campolo. Tony spoke on different controversial topics like homosexuality and illegal immigration. His theories on these topics were outside of the box and something you wouldn't think a "Christian" would say. But that was the purpose of Tony's talk, to start conversation and a mentality of approaching things in a different way. Students were exposed to several different speakers and presenters throughout the weekend.

I attended a workshop on racism and was challenged by the speakers theories and philosophies towards it. According to Ernest Crosby, when we get frustrated or angry when we see or experience racism it is because we personally haven't dealt with the pain and sores that we have within ourselves. We have sores and scabs over our hearts, and when we get rubbed in the wrong way the sores and scabs are exposed. We need to come to peace with ourselves and begin the healing process. We also are called to speak up when we see or experience racism. If someone tells a racial joke or when a racial act occurs we need to call them out. We are afraid to offend or to cause trouble but without exposing racism it will always be a part our society. Racism will die if we talk about it openly, and more and more people begin to understand why something is offensive.
I was convicted by Ernest' words, because I often step back or don't say anything when something bothers me racially. I got to put this conviction into action when a student from another college said a racial joke about Japanese people while presenting to the larger group. I pulled her aside and told her that I was offended by the joke. I'm not sure how if she really understood why I pulled her aside but I was happy that I talked to her about it and got my feelings off my chest. Hopefully she will think about what she says in the future.

My favorite part of the weekend overall was that I got to meet several students from Geneva and bond with them. It's amazing how one weekend brings people together. It was great to laugh and joke around with students in a different setting.