RA’s are used to being the one that resident’s go to; however, for RA Kelsey Green she assists both RA’s and residents. This Applied Psychology major has served a part of the RA family for 3 years and could be described as one of the most blunt, outrageous and supportive members on the staff.
Kelsey, who is graduating this May, reminisces on what first inspired her to pursue the RA position. It took 2 people and one additional factor to inspire Kelsey to pursue the RA position. “I had to become an RA in order to pay for college,” Kelsey laughed. But she adds that Sue Rowley from Residence Life and Judy Rile from Financial Aid also inspired her to apply. “Since I was a desk monitor, Sue encouraged me to apply for the position. And Judy, who was my FYS teacher, told me to apply for it.”
Each year Kelsey has adored her RA family and finds it to be one of the most rewarding parts of the position. “Being able to have a family of 22 other people including ProStaff and making friends is my favorite part of being a RA” Kelsey said. However, she acknowledged how cliché that answer was and added: “Also, being able to help form friendships between the first years and seeing those friendships grow in the following semesters.”
However, one thing she could go without hearing is being called a “disciplinarian” time and time again. “So people, who I don’t even know, think of me as the cop of Penn State Berks,” Kelsey answered.
Aside from going to class, working at Chipotle and the Ivy desk, interning for Dr. Lindsey and doing other RA duties, Kelsey can be found in her room “jamming out to Youtube music videos,attempting homework and hanging out with friends.”
However, during the summer, Kelsey can be found working with the elderly. “I work part-time now, but I’ve worked with Masonic Village Lodge, which is a nursing home, for the past 5 years. And for two of my internships, I worked at a hospice for a total of 300 hours,” Kelsey said.
Her love for working in gyniatrics has brought her upon this realization: “Working in a nursing home is just like college to me because there is bed hopping; there are boyfriend/girlfriend break-ups, drama, and triangle love stories.”
Kelsey is not only known for her work ethic. She is also known for her love for books. Her top three books are “The Mortal Instruments series” from Cassandra Clare, “What’s in a name?”, and “The Fault in our Stars” by John Greene.
“The Fault in our Stars had me crying. I finished it in Guiseppe’s econ class – horrible decision. I mine as well have put goggles filled with onions on my eyeballs during that class because I cried so silently and so sadly, it was depressing,” Kelsey said.
When Professor Guiseppe acknowledged Kelsey’s condition that day he said, “Yeah, you know the economic crash gets to me too.”
It is also well-known that Kelsey also has a Partner in Crime (PIC) since she enrolled in Penn State Berks in 2010. When asked what she thought of her PIC, she answered jokingly, “What do I think of her? I’d have to say that if I ever came to her and said, ‘I need a favor from you, you can’t ask me what is and you can’t talk about it later, but we are gonna hurt some people.’ I know that she will respond, ‘I’ll grab my car keys.’ Let me just leave it at that.”
Kelsey and her PIC have been known in pulling shenanigans on the RA’s on staff for fun. In one particular instance, Kelsey and her PIC took former RA Trevor Houck’s DVD’s that he rented from the library after an All-Hall meeting.
“Me and my friend Bianca decided to make an encrypted letter using not only the title of the movies but making an encrypted message in different highlighted colors. You would have to follow the colors of each letter to decode the message in the letter. Unfortunately, Trevor did not get to decode the message hidden between colors because we forgot he was color blind,” Kelsey laughed.
In the end, Kelsey and Bianca had already returned the movies in the library; therefore only making Trevor assume that he would be charged for not returning his DVDs on time.
“That was our best shenanigan by far,” Kelsey answered.
Although Kelsey is graduating at the end of this semester, it is safe to say that her boisterous opinions, support and playful nature will be missed in residence life. For RA Rounds with Kelsey, if you remember nothing about this student leader, remember her love for chipotle, her straight-forward attitude, and the tiny pranks she pulled.
All photography used in RA Rounds is supported by Emilio Figueroa, CEO of E.F Photography.