Unfiltered Story #341932

I’m a resident assistant at my college. My residence hall is mainly freshmen and is considered by most to be the “party dorm”. You are allowed to have alcohol in this hall if you are over 21, but of course most of the residents are not. I personally don’t have a problem with them drinking in the hall- they’re young, dumb, and they’re going to do it anyway, so I’d rather it happen in the res hall where I can keep them safe as opposed to out at a bar. That said, the college takes alcohol violations VERY seriously, and if I catch an underage resident drinking in the dorm I HAVE to report them.

One night I’m in my room studying and I hear a commotion down the hall. Quiet hours are enforced after 8pm so I go to find the source of the noise and tell them to quiet down. I trace the source to a room two doors down from mine and knock on the door. Note that when we knock on someone’s door, we have to announce our title so students know we’re from Residence Life.

When the resident opens the door, she’s holding a half-empty bottle of wine in one hand. I know this girl, and that she is underage. She doesn’t seem to realize I’ve busted her until I start to ask for her student ID. The rest of her friends stare at me blankly and don’t say anything throughout the confrontation.

It was my first alcohol violation, so I didn’t really know what to do- my training kind of flew out of my head. I confiscated the wine, poured it out in my sink, and brought the bottle downstairs where I called my supervisor. Because I took the bottle, though, I basically made it so Public Safety wasn’t allowed to investigate and the residents didn’t get in trouble. I also got put on probation for the rest of the semester. Just goes to show the value of paying attention during training!