Welcome to Brazos Matters.

I'm Jay Socol, and with me is campus student content contributor Kaleigh Mazy.

Kaleigh, how are you doing?

I'm doing great.

How are you doing?

Great.

Okay, so story time.

When I enrolled at Texas A&M in the fall of 1987, I know that was way, way before you were born.

I also entered the lottery for a dorm room here.

And that year, A&M allowed too many people into school.

There were 6000 of us.

Which is laughable now because, I don't know, it's something like 12,000 for a freshman class.

But the luck of that lottery draw was not with me at that time.

So that meant I had to find an apartment, and there were a decent number of those way back then, when the community and the university were much smaller and those apartments range from pretty simple to what was considered luxurious at the time, but would not be considered that now.

Did you have a particular, you know, dorm story when you tried to get into school?

Well, I didn't want to pay the housing application fee because I wasn't sure if I was going to come to A&M.

So I waited until the last minute to do that.

So I got waitlisted, put in a corps dorm, and then put in a converted room and then had to stock the resident life page to get into a room that was that opened up.

But I did get into a room and then it ended up all working out.

What was it?

What was your dorm?

I stayed and Dunn Hall.

Dunn Hall.

All right, all right.

That's a part of the Commons, right?

Yes.

Okay.

All right, so that's my story from, nearly 40 years ago in the net number of dorm rooms within Central Campus probably hasn't budged a whole lot, but A&M zone housing portfolio does look a bit different.

And so does the landscape for student apartments.

You know, just look, at a city within a city that is developing skyward at Northgate.

So our guest today is here to talk to us about the many opportunities and challenges that come with managing A&M on campus housing portfolio, including convincing students and families to consider campus living before defaulting to the resort style amenities across the street and beyond.

So say hello to Texas A&M Director of Residence Life Dr.

Kyle McCracken.

How are you doing, Kyle?

I'm doing well, sir.

How are you?

Good.

That was a long wind up I know.

Sounded great to me.

I learned a little bit.

I enjoyed it.

Okay, so talk to us about your your path to this role and what is residence life at Texas A&M.

Sure.

So I think, when I consider my path, probably started when I was 18 years old, as a freshman, I didn't I didn't attend A&M as a, undergraduate student.

I pretty sure I wouldn't have gotten in here, to be perfectly honest with you.

I lived on campus.

I had a freshman seminar course, and my teacher for that course happened to be our director of housing.

And the second day of class, he told me he's like, you should be an RV.

And I had no interest in that whatsoever.

What I knew about IRAs at the time was man had been fired before school started, and we opened with that one.

And so I didn't really know much about them.

And as the semester wore on and, this individual kind of really became a mentor for me.

And so I took him up on his offer, and I ended up being an RA for six semesters, an undergraduate hall director for my, for my seventh.

I've got a degree in biological sciences, so I wasn't necessarily on the higher ed career trajectory.

But when it came time to go to pro school, the way that I phrase it is, I was, I was to fund for a 4.0, but I was too smart for a 2.0, which is a difficult place to be when you want to go into, medical field, which is kind of what I want to do.

I want to be an orthopedic surgeon.

Okay.

And so I surveyed my options and during my time, living on campus and just being a student, I was involved in SGA.

I did leadership academy.

I was a presidents ambassador, which is kind of a tour guide.

Slash, high level event student participant thing.

And I really gained a lot from my collegiate experience, and I think I wanted to give that back.

So I went to I went to grad school and got a master's in higher ed, and I took my first job in the state of Texas.

Was there for a couple of years that I would look to.

I look to get into a doc program.

And when I looked, A&M was at the top of the list.

From this part of the country kind of knew that I wanted to spend my career here, had no doubts today and and would provide the quality of education and the brand name that would help me with my career.

And so I, I applied for a job here, and they were nice enough to tell me.

Yes.

And then I got to know doc program, and I've been here for 14 years.

Wow.

About to be 15.

And so it not the path that I had ironed out for myself when I was an 18 year old freshman.

But it's the path that that I've taken.

It's definitely been a rewarding one so far.

Okay, so what is race life.

Sure.

So I think the best way that I describe it for you is, is on campus living really looks to engage students, and their collegiate experience.

And so, so much of what happens on a college campus does happen outside of the academic classroom.

And that's not to say that that's not important.

That's the core function of the institution.

That's what we're here for.

It is the foundational cornerstone of what a university experience is.

But you're only in class so many hours a day.

And so for us, it's that home away from home, for a lot of students, when they go to a university, they've never been away from home for a long period of time.

And so for us, it's really that landing place.

Yes.

We want to provide for walls and a roof for students.

But it's a lot more than just a place to live.

In some ways, I think of a residential experience is kind of like owning a house.

Sometimes a good residential experience is one you don't think about.

So you don't go home and think, man, I love my house every day.

But when you have a problem with your house, all of a sudden you're like, man, this is the most annoying thing in my life right now.

So I think providing that foundational food, water, shelter, space really in enable students to have the opportunity to maximize their collegiate experience, whether that's getting involved in after hours research in some of our labs on campus, whether that's engaging in student organizations and some of the meetings that are taking place every night of the week, whether that's having easy access and parking for football games in the fall.

But I think it really provides that launching pad and that opportunity for students to have a place on campus that they can go, they can retreat to, they can feel comfortable in that space, but also provides that, convenience and that support that allows them to get out into the university community and be a part of it.

I think for us, some of the unique things that we really try to do, you know, we really try to provide opportunities to get involved in their community, be part of their whole government and be part of our programing experience and opportunities for students to engage in events together.

We do a lot of work, with academic support initiatives.

We have study spaces on campus.

We sponsor sessions in our residential areas.

We have an internal to the department, student leadership opportunities with department wide organizations.

We also employ about 450 student workers.

And so for students who are looking for a, for an employment experience, within the Division of Student Affairs, we're the second largest employer right behind our friends over across the street, direct sports.

And so whether it's being an RA, whether it's being an academic peer mentor, working one of our desks, we really try to provide an opportunity that really set students up for success holistically during their time here on campus.

So you oversee a substantial operation, what, over 10,000 students probably, or or in these dorms?

You said over 400, employees.

I guess.

Which is more all that is more than twice the number of people who were in my hometown.

But what are the challenges of running such a large department?

Sure.

So we we we have over 11,000 students on campus.

And really, it's the I think the challenge is, is there's there's the challenge of size and scope of it is a lot.

There are lots of rooms, there are lots of beds.

We have lots of students.

But also making sure that we're doing the appropriate, appropriate amount of work to really individualize and hone that down so that we care about individual students and what goes on with their experience.

And so they do it in a variety of ways.

You know, obviously we have a lot of square footage.

And so improving everything all at once can be a challenge.

And so I think really thinking strategically about the way that we manage our facilities, you mentioned kind of what our, our, skyline to the north looks like, and resort style living is, is, is here, you know, you've you've got the lazy rivers, the rooftop pools, and those are things that financially we're not able to provide to students.

And so for us, it's really about strategically improving our facilities on a cyclical basis that allows us to maintain a level of competition.

But also that we're spreading that that quote unquote wealth across our communities.

We have over 64 buildings that we're managing.

And I think part of it is also unique, managing unique needs across campus.

So, you know, we have the quad where the corps cadets lives.

And, you know, we have over 2600 beds in the quad, what the cadets need in their living experience and the relationship we have with the office of the commandant is not the same type of work.

It's not the same type of experience that we're providing for students who live over at the Gardens Apartments, over across, university, where a lot of those students may be international or they may be parents or they may be graduate students, which is not the same experience that we're providing to students who, live in our residence halls, who may be part of a learning community, and they may be focused on engineering, or they may be part of our honors community.

And so I think really, it's taking a holistic view of what we're able to do as a department, how we're able to impact the student experience, both from a physical, facility standpoint, but also from a programmatic and a student engagement standpoint, and really provide an opportunity where students feel like we're paying attention to the individual.

Because I think you get lost in the 11,000 students.

It's a lot, and it absolutely is.

But I think we do a lot of work through our staffing team to really focusing back on the individual.

I think the way that I phrase it to my team when we talk about it is, is with so many spaces, if, if we had 5000 rooms and that's not the right number, but let's say we had 5000 for discussions like, and we deliver a amazing experience on 4980.

Well, from a percentage standpoint, that's really successful.

But the fact of the matter and the way that we have to view that is that's 20 people or that's 20 rooms where we didn't deliver.

And that 20% is really what's the most important piece.

And I think taking that sense of care, individuality and really wanting to make it a good experience for every person that lives with us, is really one of the challenges to both manage the sheer scale, but also get down to the individual impact of the students that live with us and know them as people and connect them to their community as well.

Sure, sure.

Unlike most offices that run during typical business hours, for us, life doesn't really sleep.

It's a 24 hour, business.

Issues and emergencies can arise at any time.

So how do you, you know, get things done but maintain a healthy work life balance for you and your team?

Sure.

So, you know, we have we have a designated on call on duty system that really kind of helps us with that.

After our process.

We have a, RAs on duty in every building when we're open fully during the academic year, we kind of scale that back for the summer.

And we got several levels of duty above them.

That way we kind of filter calls into the appropriate place, depending on what the nature of the incident is.

But the nature of my job and some of the people that I work with is you're right, it's 24 over seven, 365.

And even if our buildings aren't always open or we don't all have students in the building, those buildings are always running.

There's always electricity, there's always water.

And so whether it's a facilities emergency or whether it's a student support, crisis or situation that we need to intervene on, we kind of are in a position where we're we're prepared to do that.

I think in terms of how do we manage that or how do we take care of the people?

I think taking care of the people is foundationally important.

I think especially in a in a field or in a job responsibility where it can be really immersive.

It's hard to get away.

And some of our staff members actually live where they work.

So it's not a situation where they drive home.

At the end of the day, for some of our staff, they live full time in our buildings.

And so I think being responsive to your staff needs encouraging them to take time away.

I know everybody wants to do a good job.

Everybody wants to be passionate, committed.

But I think finding opportunities and really empowering them to take time away, take a little bit of time to recharge.

I know for us, we kind of work within the university rules as best we're able.

If something does happen and someone's up all night or something is off schedule or something kind of throws, people schedule out of whack, we have some opportunities that we can engage in to really kind of give some of that time back.

I think we do a lot of follow up with our staff in terms of just checking in.

How are you doing?

How are you feeling?

Especially when we deal with some really high intensity situations, whether it's we have to move people because of a facilities issue or whether we have a student mental health crisis or some of the things that go on.

But I think checking in with staff after the fact and just making sure that they're good to go when they're ready to plug back in, has been really, really helpful.

And I also think that, you know, understanding and finding what it is that you're passionate about or what it is that really pours back into you outside of work.

So what is it that you really get something back from doing?

Encouraging our staff to explore that and know that about themselves so that they, they engage in that as well?

Yeah, yeah.

I think you had a question about living requirements.

Well, yeah.

So I think most universities require students to live on campus.

They're freshman year.

Texas A&M doesn't.

So I'd love for you to pitch why a student should choose to live on campus their first year.

Sure.

So you're absolutely right.

We for most of our students, they're not required to live on campus, save for some scholarship programs.

And, you know, voluntary participation in the in the corps students who live with us are choosing to do so.

And, you know, we're fortunate that we have upperclassmen students that have a great experience, and they want to continue to remain with us for a couple of years afterwards.

But we also have a large percentage of the first year class who wants to live with us.

I think if I was trying to pitch it or if I would say why you should pick us, I think what I would tell you is we're really working around the clock to make the collegiate experience for students better.

And really, what we're focused on is providing an opportunity and a physical space on campus for students to have access and support to all the things that they need during their time here.

And I think we really try to plug them into what that means for them uniquely.

I think one of the interesting things about a university this large, in a first year class this large is, you know, students don't have a consistent, quote unquote experience.

Literally every student who comes to this institution is going to experience it differently, which is fascinating with the amount of affinity that we can achieve and the sense of connection in the sense of tradition that we have, that for so many students who are going to experience it a little bit differently, we're able to connect on such a large scale, with some of these connection pieces to the institution.

So I think when you look at what we're doing in terms of staff support, that we have round the clock staff availability for students, that they need anything they have the question, they have a problem with the room, if they're not sure where to go or what to do, we have somebody living in with you to, to really support that.

I think we go above and beyond, to try to make sure that we're providing access to the academic support across the institution, whether it's easy access to being able to just get to where faculty physically are, whether that's easy access to late night lab hours.

I talked a little bit earlier about situations, you know, or even really trying to develop students as leaders.

I think one of what is emphasized session.

Oh, supplemental instruction, I think you absolutely.

Because I think the other thing that we I think the other thing that's really important to remember is, is yes, students are absolutely, absolutely coming here for a degree and that's going to prepare them for a career.

But I think we as an institution, and I think one of the things that we want to do as, as life is understand that along the way that for five, maybe six years, depending on, you know, what the students up to during that time, there are a lot of opportunities to prepare them and equip them with skills and knowledge and experience that isn't necessarily the degree or the sheet of paper, but that's going to really position them to be successful in their next step, whether that's graduate school, law school, a full time career in engineering, going to be a teacher.

I think there's a lot of things that we do institutionally, and we do it through student employment.

We do it the leadership development that really kind of amplify that student experience and give them the opportunity to gain knowledge and skills along the way.

That really sets them apart from other people who may be graduating from other institutions with the same degree.

Yeah, and I think we're really invested in that as a department.

Let's take a quick second to reintroduce you.

If you're just tuning in, I'm Jay Socol, along with campus student content contributor Kaleigh Mazy and our guest today is Dr Kyle McCracken, director of Residence Life at Texas A&M.

All right.

So, I struggled with my timeline of applying for housing.

So what's your advice for students and families trying to navigate on campus housing options, and when should they begin applying for it?

Right.

So typically our our application cycle is going to start in mid-September.

We try to open early.

And that way we give the opportunity for students who receive early admittance to the institution.

That way those two things kind of flow closely together.

I think the best advice I can give, because we do, we do assign based off of the application date and because we can't house the entire first year class, in particular, because I want to I want to speak to first year students in particular, because we do have a contract renewal process for upperclassmen.

But for I think for those first year students who are newly admitted to the institution, the best thing that they can do is apply as soon as they're accepted to the institution.

And so we're going to accept applications literally as long as we can.

And usually most of the time we're able to accept applications either for a permanent assignment or even for a temporary assignment.

And we can usually hold that list open until mid-February once we get into mid-February.

Historically speaking, that's kind of a date that we start to really look at to say, okay, maybe we're full, maybe we need to move to wait list.

And when we see what happens with admissions decisions or when we see what happens with scholarship packages and financial aid, and some students used to come or go or some students are waiting on, you know, are they going to get that co-op or that internship experience they want?

When we start to see some of that movement in where students will physically be in the fall.

And so I think definitely completing the application early, I think also, selecting a range of options that you're interested in.

I know a lot of times we get students who, their preference is, is I want to I want to single in this building or a single in this building, in a single in this building.

And with the demand of housing, we have to be perfectly honest with you.

We just don't have a lot of singles.

And so, you know, requesting multiple housing options that you'd be satisfied with or that you be comfortable with really gives us the flexibility to be able to assign students.

I think the other thing is, is, you know, we have a staff who's solely dedicated to kind of working our application and our assignment process.

And I think the other thing is, is for us, we work in a system every day that we're used to seeing, we're used to talking about it.

And we're we're very familiar with the way it works.

I was a first generation college student, and I will tell you, when I went through the process of applying for housing or when I applied for a lot of things at the university, I had no idea what I was doing.

And so I think feeling comfortable, and being willing to just ask the question, others were more than happy to help, but we don't know what you need, or we don't know what to answer unless you're willing to ask the question.

So I think reaching out, through a housing office, we've got a forward facing housing assignment office that does great work.

They do work by phone.

They do work by email.

And so more than willing to answer any questions that people have along the way, especially with it being kind of a multi piece process.

So there's an initial application which kind of triggers a second phase which gets into some of the housing preferences.

Do you want to be part of a learning community.

And then we kind of go through a latency period before we get into roommate selection.

Then ultimately, room selection there at the end.

And so it is a phased process.

And understandably, while we're very familiar with it, it can be a little confusing.

So I just want to empower people and help people feel comfortable.

We don't mind taking your call if it can help you navigate the process.

It helps us get you into a space that you're comfortable with and that you're happy with.

Can we talk about common spaces for a second?

So I my assumption is common spaces are fairly standard for campus housing.

You know, places where students can socialize or take part in some organized events.

But now with most students having earbuds in their ears, having screens fill their senses.

Are these common spaces is still being used the way they were intended?

Or has that changed in some way for you guys?

The way they're intended?

Maybe not necessarily exactly to the exact function.

If you look at our housing portfolio, we have buildings that were built 115 years ago.

We have buildings that were opened a decade ago and kind of the whole portfolio in between.

And so if you look at kind of the evolution of housing on a college campus, you know, for us, there was a time where they were barracks and literally you were meant to sleep there and then get out and go do stuff.

Yeah.

And then you look at trends in student housing.

Housing wasn't always built for students to congregate in a centralized location.

A lot of times it was built for them to not congregate in the building and get out and go places.

Other places.

I think one of the things that we've done a good job at is we've retrofit some of our buildings to have some of that small scale community gathering space in them, where our students want kind of a more centralized or group space in the building.

We have it.

I think what you would notice if we were to walk around our facilities, I think you would notice a lot of purpose built seating, or purpose built spaces where students can just kind of land.

You know, a lot of times when you think about community space, you think about the idea of a traditional program where we're going to get together and we're going to host this thing on this day at this time, and you're going to come learn about something.

And we still do that.

But what we've also found is, is and going back to that unique individual student experience students have, go figure.

Students have lives.

Right.

And so within that, each of their days look different.

And so the opportunity to just walk down a hallway and say, ooh, there's an open seat, I'm going to sit there and I'm going to knock out some email, or I'm going to do this discussion prompt, or I'm going to do this posting for my online chat group.

We provide a lot of spaces and a lot of seating that students can just use come and go.

One of the things we've really moved to is our spaces.

We use a lot of dry erase furniture, which is meant and built to be written on.

We're an engineering school, so like our buildings and our furniture, appropriately so, is littered with equations, where students literally sit down and they work on the table because the table is built to be workable.

So I think you'd you'd walk around our spaces and you'd see in those common spaces a variety of different seating options, a variety of different options where students could it's made where students can build laptops.

It's made for students, can be on phones.

It's made where students can just sit, every now and then you see a student napping.

But we do that in our community learning centers, which are kind of quiet study labs that we have.

You could go into a large open community space like the Commons and see the variety of seating in there.

You can see what we do in the first floor of Hullabaloo Hall with some of the seating there.

But even in some of our residence halls, we have some of those smaller spaces where students can go and gather and they can sit in a sit in a couch or sit on a stool and just be around each other.

Or they can just sit in the hallway and just interact with people if they want to, and then not if they don't got it, got it.

As a director of Rez Life, what are your goals, you know, in the future, next five, ten years to see?

Yeah, I think I think for us it's it's how do we can continue to be current with students.

So I think a lot of times, you know, we think about the university has to change over time.

But even those students, when they come to us, they're generally kind of that same age group in their same place, kind of developmentally, fundamentally, students are different.

You know, you talk about different generations.

But I feel like every year students change a little bit.

And so I think the onus is on us to be responsive, to create a residential experiences where where it applies to and it fits what those students need.

And so I think being very attentive to how students engage socially, I think being inventive, attentive to how students are engaging the academic environment or how they really participate in the formal learning of the institution.

I think we do some of that with furniture.

We do some of that with, I think the other thing is sometimes we just ask the question a lot of the things that we do because everything that we do is student driven.

We ask students.

And so, like when we're looking at new furniture, we literally get together a group of students and we bring in furniture and we like, sit on.

This is a comfortable would you sit here for a long time?

You know, do you like the color?

Is this relaxing for you?

And you know, the same thing would be true.

Since I've been here, I've had the opportunity to work on a couple housing projects where we actually built buildings.

Every time I've seen us build a building or do a large scale renovation, we've had student focus groups where students came in and said, this is what we're looking for in space.

This is what we want to use in your space.

I think for us, part of it's about maximizing space.

You know, you mentioned the the first year classes as large over 12,000.

We can't house all the first year students on campus.

And we know that that first year on campus is important for students and really helpful for retention and for grades and things like that.

So it's really how do we maximize spaces to offer, the most flexible housing experience we can with students?

We try to do that with a variety of stratified price points.

We do that with a variety of different living types.

But right now our, our housing portfolio is what it is.

And so I think being really agile for the future, working with the institution about what is, what is the institution need from residence life and what role does that residential experience play in the progression of the institution is is really important for us as well.

Okay, so we've got about a minute to go.

I want to ask you a quick question here.

What has a shocking what piece of furniture has a shockingly long lifespan and a shockingly short lifespan?

I would say.

Bed frames.

Long or short?

Long.

Most bed frames last a really long time.

What is a long time?

I mean, most of those, they live through our furniture replacement cycle.

So, you know, if we said that the replacement cycle on this piece of furniture is going to be eight years, they're still in pretty good shape when we got the replacement cycle.

Okay.

Ones that don't end anything with drawers or shelves seems to really struggle.

And I don't know if it's just wear and tear.

I don't know if it's, you know, you've you've had a long day and you're tired and you, you know, drop something on the shelf and then, you know, I don't know what it is, but anything, anything with shelves seems to really, really take a beating.

But I also think about, like, in my own life, do I pay any attention to the shelves?

And sometimes the answer is like, no, I don't.

And so it could be one of those things where it's just it is what it is.

Okay.

And, and finally, oldest dorm in new inventory and newest dorm, Leggett Hall, oldest building.

How old?

1911.

Woof.

And then newest building that the that we've been a part over that we work with is, the White Creek apartments, 2016.

Okay.

I feel like we could fill another 28 minutes, but we've done it this time.

Dr Kyle McCracken, thanks so much for joining us.

Thank you.

I appreciate the opportunity.

And like I said, if we can be helpful or if you have any interest in learning more about housing, we're happy to hear from you.

Perfect.

Brazos matters is a production of Aggieland's Public Radio 90.9 KAMU FM, a member of Texas A&M University's Division of Community Engagement.

Our show is engineered and edited by Matt Dittman.

All Brazos Matters episodes are available on YouTube or on your favorite podcast platform like Spotify, Apple, iHeart, and Amazon.

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We'd love for you to rate and review and subscribe so you never miss an episode.

For Kaleigh Mazy, I'm Jay Socol.

Thank you so much for watching and for listening and we hope you have a wonderful day.