Due to Texas State’s record-breaking freshman class and a lack of on-campus housing, some Resident Assistants (RA) are now required to live with a student roommate if needed based on availability.

At the start of the fall semester, there were 52 freshmen living with their RAs as their roommates on campus. As of Sept. 9, that number now sits at 22 students, according to Bill Mattera, Director of Housing and Residential Life (DHRL).

Mattera said the department plans to relocate all freshmen living with a resident assistant (RA) to different rooms. The timeline for this change is still unclear but the goal of completing it is the end of the fall semester.

“We want the RA to go back to having the room because that’s our preference,” Mattera said. “The other piece is that the student wants to get settled. If they’re living with an RA roommate in Sterry [Hall] and they get reassigned, we want to get them there, so they can start building the community and getting settled as soon as possible.”

Because Texas State does not have enough on-campus housing to accommodate all freshmen and RAs living on campus, DHRL uses three flexible housing options for when they are over capacity: convertible lounges, hotel rooms and RAs having roommates.

Bailey Sloas, an art education freshman at The College Inn, found out in June that instead of having two other freshmen as her suitemates, her RA would be her suitemate.

“Both of us were pretty scared,” Sloas said. “Not scared enough where I’m like, ‘I don’t want to do this.’ I was just like, ‘I don’t know what’s going to happen’.”

Sloas said while the situation is unusual, she has enjoyed living with her RA even though it’s not the traditional college experience.

“I think it would be fun to live with four girls total, so we can be a little fun friend group,” Sloas said. “I’m not saying that I don’t love my RA, she’s great, but it would be the full experience to be living with four girls. That’s what I was expecting.”

In 2022, RAs were compensated for having a roommate with a flat rate of around $100-150 regardless of whether they had a roommate for two weeks or the full semester, according to former RA and Texas State alumna Regina Macias. However, according to the 2024-25 RA employee agreement, RAs no longer receive additional compensation for having a roommate.

“They told us, ‘You just have a roommate now,’” Macias said. “We tried to address the idea of letting [the RAs] live together to eliminate that awkwardness. We’re at the same [power] level, so if the issue arises between [another RA] and I, then there isn’t that weird power dynamic.”

After Macias was assigned a freshman roommate in fall 2022, she came back to her dorm room smelling like marijuana during the first week of school.

“One of the things [DHRL was] very clear about is you should treat them like every other resident,” Macias said. “That’s really awkward to live with somebody and be like, ‘Hey, also, I’m gonna call the cops’.”

Macias said when the RAs were told they were receiving roommates in fall 2022, there was not much training on how to navigate these situations aside from informing the RAs of the new policy.

“I was also 21 at the time, so another concern I had [was] I have a life outside of this job,” Macias said. “I just turned 21, [and] I’m not going to stop living my life because of this, but then I can’t come in obviously coming straight from The Square into my own room because I have a resident there.”

Tabby Keep, another former RA from fall 2022 and Texas State alumna said she and her freshman roommate got along well despite the “weird power dynamic.”

“We were very chill with each other, but we pretty much just lived our own lives and chitchatted every now and then,” Keep said. “It really did feel like we were friends. There wasn’t anything that needed to be addressed. But if there was a situation…I think that dynamic would just not be good at all.”

Mattera said while RAs living with student roommates can create an awkward situation, being an RA creates a power dynamic between peers that can be difficult to navigate regardless of roommates.

“The RA job itself is this conundrum that exists,” Mattera said. “The thing that I keep stressing to the RAs is our goal is to get these folks out of these rooms as quickly as possible.”

Mattera said DHRL’s goal is to have enough housing inventory to eventually house the entire first-year class and be able to house upperclassmen students who want to stay on campus while not having to use any flexible housing options.