Story By: Stephen Solomon
When moving into the residence halls for the first time, it is important for students to make it feel like home because, for the next year, it will be their home.
One of the ways students at Missouri Western have been able to make their residence halls more comfortable is adding decoration.
In every residential hall, there are resident assistants who are in charge of overseeing a certain number of residence halls and making sure students are following the rules. Often times, these RAs begin the decoration ideas for their students.
Hannah Herrick, a student living in the residence halls, said when she first moved on campus, her RA gave them a theme that she wanted her hallway to be decorated like. So, everyone living in that hallway decorated the outside of their doors so that they would all be using the same theme.
“That was really fun,” Herrick said. “For a new student in the dorms, it can be intimidating, but having an RA rally all the students together to participate in something together makes it easy to meet new people. Having a common theme gave all of us something in common right at the beginning of school.”
Missouri Western gives its students living in the residence halls the opportunity to decorate their rooms however they want, the only exception being painting and nail holes.
Although Missouri Western gives students living in the residence halls the opportunity to decorate their rooms, they want each student to decorate their room differently. This varies from student to student, some things to take in consideration is gender, age, involvement on campus and year in school.
Kayla Blystone, another student living in the residence halls says that her room is themed around her sorority.
“My room is decorated due to my involvement here on campus,” Blystone said. “I am an active member of Alpha Sigma Alpha, so if you enter my room, you will see that almost all my decorations are sorority decorations. I think the students decorate their room based on what makes them happy and what represents them the most. Alpha Sigma Alpha represents me and you can definitely see that by the way my room is decorated.”
On the other hand, student Wes Mitter says that he believes vary between guys and girls.
“I think room decorations are based on gender,” Mitter said. “Females are a lot more likely to decorate their room, because it’s more than just a room to them.”
At Missouri Western, room decorations are more than just room decorations. It gives the students an opportunity to express themselves and to show what really matters to them through the decorations of their room.