Congratulations on your new position as president or vice president of your Hall Governing Board (HGB). The duties of each position are defined differently depending on which hall you are in and the way the position is set up in your hall’s constitution. This manual is an overview of how most halls define their HGB president and vice president. As an executive board member of your hall you also have some duties similar to the rest of the board. This includes anything from helping the ROC Rep by attending a ROC General Assembly meeting, to taking minutes for the secretary when he or she is out. Your job is always to improve community life and make your residence hall here at the University of Maine not just a dormitory, but a home. 

 

I urge you, if you ever have any questions or concerns, to contact any of the Executives in Residents on Campus (ROC). We are formally trained for our positions and know how to help in situations that you face as a president or vice president of a HGB.

 

EXPECTATIONS

President 

There are several duties that the president is responsible for. Basically the president’s job is to be the leader of the hall. This means attending and overseeing programs and activities in the hall and running HGB meetings and executive council meetings. You are also responsible to make sure that the ROC Rep attends the ROC General Assembly meetings, and that the treasurer is keeping an accurate record of Hall spending.

Vice President

There are also many things that the vice president must be responsible for. The main purpose of the vice president on most HGBs is to replace the president if he or she cannot attend a meeting or activity. Other duties can include running events and, in some halls, running the HGB meetings. This is a very open ended position. The best thing to do with this position is to take on activities. Be the one in charge of the concert. The more you take advantage of this role as vice president, the stronger your hall’s board will become.

A LEADER

 

The main thing to remember is that your role is to be a leader. This is the hardest part of the job. Being able to lead a group, without being a dictator, is a very difficult task, but because you have this manual, it must mean that your hall thinks you are up to the task.

I divide leaders into to extremes. The first are the dictators. These people usually also have large egos. They put themselves on a pedestal and just tell everyone what to do. The other end of that are the task keepers. These people tend to take on everything and do not know how to delegate, or they may not trust anyone else to do the task. Both ends of the spectrum tend to have large egos. To be an effective leader, you must overcome your confidence to find an effective leadership style. This style, in my opinion, is somewhere between the two extremes stated before.

HOW TO RUN A MEETING

 

There are many ways to run meetings. The idea is to have a good time while still getting things done. This is not an easy task, but I have a few ideas that could help you. The main idea I have is to get Robert’s Rules of Order out of HGB meetings. Also, there are many techniques that will help in making the meeting inviting, yet still productive.

Some hall’s have in their constitution that the meetings should be run using Robert’s Rules of Order. I don’t agree with this and strongly encourage you to change this in your constitution if it is there. First of all, many people don’t know Robert’s Rules to effectively use it for the entire hall to meet. Second, if it is just the Executive members of your board, Robert’s Rules starts giving lots of suggestions to make the meetings simpler to run for a small group. This shows that even Robert had second thoughts about small groups following his guide to effective meetings. Third, it is an anti-brainstorming way to run a meeting. This means that when it comes down to creating ideas for hall activities, people are on their own. HGB meetings should be idea meetings, not just business meetings.

There are many ways to create an effective meeting. The key thing is to have set goals for the meeting. This can be stated in your agenda. Then it should be posted for all people that can attend the meeting. This means HGB meeting agendas should be posted on FirstClass and posted on bulletin boards, and Executive meetings should be sent to the members. Let people know what the objective of the meeting is, so they can be as constructive as possible during the meeting time. Another thing to do is to have an icebreaker before each meeting. This will make the meeting fun to start out, and make people want to attend. This also gets people use to talking to each other to open up and be creative with their ideas. The last suggestion I have for effective meetings is to bring some toys. The best thing is some soft stress ball, or foam ball. They can use it to stay attentive and awake with something keeping their hands busy. It can also be used as something to throw at someone if they don’t like an idea. It opens people up to say that they don’t agree with something, without the stress of upsetting the person with the idea.

A useful website for icebreakers is www.residentassistant.com. And a good site for effective meetings is www.3m.com/meetingnetwork/.

 

PRESIDENT'S COUNCIL

 

There will be times throughout the year when the President of ROC, currently Scott R. Reynolds, will ask to meet with the presidents of all the halls. This group of president’s is considered president’s council. Usually the meetings are once or twice a month to work on issues with HGBs. The meetings will focus on how to improve being an effective HGB President. This meeting structure will make you a better candidate to attend regional and national conferences to represent ROC and The University of Maine. The structure of these meetings will be worked out at the first meeting. Attendance is mandatory, so either the Vice President or President must attend every meeting.

OTHER POSITION DESCRIPTIONS

 

The key to being an effective leader is knowing what the people under you are responsible for. This is the “Expectations” section for the other position’s manuals. There is much more to each position than what is stated, but this is a good overview of each positions role in the Hall Governing Board.

Secretary

There are several duties that the secretary has. The four main duties of the secretary are writing agendas for every meeting, writing the minutes for every meeting, writing articles for the ROC Newsletter, and completing Hall Event Reports.

Other duties can include many different clerical activities. This can be anything from thank you letters, to requests, to notices. The Residents on Campus Executives strongly encourage you to put together a newsletter for your hall.

Another very important thing to remember is that attendance should be taken at every meeting. It will be an official document of who in the executive board misses meetings. If there is an attendance policy in your hall’s constitution, all absences should be reported to your HGB president at each meeting.

Treasurer

There are several duties that the treasurer is responsible for. Basically the treasurer works with the money that the HGB has. This includes ROC Funds and, if your hall has one, the hall’s checking account. Dealing with money involves many checks and balances to make sure no one misuses the funds. Your job is to make sure all these checks and balances actually occur.

Residents on Campus Representative

There are several duties that the ROC Rep has. The main thing that you must do is represent your hall at ROC General Assembly meetings. If you miss too many of these, your hall will lose its funding from ROC. You must also communicate with your hall about ROC issues, and communicate with ROC about hall issues. Other duties include filling out the “Hall Withdrawal Forms” and putting on and promoting ROC events.

In one sentence, your job is to represent your hall, in the best way possible, at all ROC events and meetings.