It’s only the first day of training, but the Donaghey Student Center conference room is filled with incoming resident assistants (RAs) getting a familiar lesson on safety at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

“My goal is to know each RA on a first-name basis,” Edward L. Smith, director of Public Safety and campus chief of police at UALR, tells the young recruits.

“This is a team, and we all have a role to play,” he continues. “But more than that, this is the UALR family… we’re here to help. That’s our commitment to you.”

Smith then does something unexpected – he takes out his business card, holds it up, and reads his cell phone number aloud as almost 40 resident assistants busily scribble it down.

The meeting with Smith and UALR Department of Public Safety officers is only one of several safety-related training sessions required of all RAs, according to Rikki Turner, assistant director for residence life at UALR.

“We take safety training very seriously. In addition to the meeting with public safety, for example, there’s also fire safety, which entails several fire drills at the residence halls,” said Turner.

The fire training gives the resident assistants hands-on experience in how to properly use a fire extinguisher, under the supervision of Little Rock Fire Department officers. A fire pit is created to give each student a chance to extinguish the fire.

In addition, there is crisis response training filled with detailed but impromptu scenarios that are ‘acted out’ and require the RA to respond instantaneously, according to Turner.

“The activity is called ‘Behind Closed Doors,’ in which each room has a counselor, a police officer, a hall director, and returning RAs who help act out the scenario,” said Turner.

Some of those scenarios might include how to handle a party that has escalated out of control or ways to identify and help a student who is struggling with deep depression.

After the role playing and subsequent RA response, advice is given on what went well and what could have been better, as well as an attestation about real-life experiences, and explanation of the roles of other entities that may be involved.

Kevin Watts, 20, a junior from Wynne who is double majoring in criminal justice and political science, is in his second year as an RA. Although the training has been excellent preparation for numerous “what-if” situations, he said he has never felt seriously threatened since choosing to make Little Rock his home away from home.

“When you look at incidences as a percentage of the population, I can think of several campuses that are statistically higher,” he said. “Where people are doing the right things, good things happen. And a great majority of the time, that is how things are around here.”

Not that the RA training is all work and no play. There is a ropes course for developing teambuilding skills and an end-of-training celebration where students are given an opportunity to unwind as they prepare for the onslaught of new students on the eve of move-in day, Wednesday, Aug. 14.

Turner said each year’s training carries a new theme, and this year was no exception. This year her office used an ‘app’ theme with hashtags and apps in place of session titles.

“It’s crazy, but fun!” she said. “So, instead of ‘there’s an app for that,’ we have ‘there’s an RA for that’ – appropriate because our RAs are prepared to handle just about anything. These students are a really great group.”

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UALR is situated in the heart of Little Rock, a city recognized by Kiplinger.com and Forbes magazine as a great place for business and also by Outside Magazine for its quality of life.

Read the next article in this series, My Life @UALR, go to A tale of two RAs: students share similar paths.