Hello to all parents, guardians, families, friends, and students of 1504!
Welcome to the 1504 RC Blog for the 2023-2024 academic year! At the start of every month, the Resident Counselors (RCs) of 1504 will be updating this blog with the latest recaps of the events and activities happening in our hall, as well as other important campus information. It is our hope that this blog will serve as an easily-accessible collection of all the memories that we will be making as a hall community and in our individual wings.
The 1504 RCs are so excited to get to know each of the students and how to best support them as this year goes on, and along the way, we will be doing our best to make everyday life in this hall as fun as possible through our programs, events, trips, and regular interactions! All of that and more will be documented every month in this blog.
General 1504 Information
To give you a general introduction to the staff members of 1504, we are (pictured from left to right) Cynthia Smith (1504 B-wing), Kylie Marsden (1504 C-wing), and Ethan Castro (1504 D-wing), and we are the RCs for 1504 for the 2023-2024 school year. As it stands, the 1504 A-wing RC position is currently vacant with the departure of former RC Rafael Gonzalez, so the three of us will be sharing supervision of 1504 A-wing and the students within it. All 1504 A-wing students, parents, and guardians will be informed of their interim RC assignment soon, so stay tuned for that!
As the RCs for this building, we serve as the professional supervisors and mentors for your students when their classes are over and they return to their on-campus "home" for the school year. We are professionally trained to respond to any emergency situations and at least one RC will always be present overnight in the building to assist with any situations that may arise. Outside of these duties, we also play an active role in checking in with your students to see how they are adapting and responding to the various challenges and opportunities of the school year. We regularly monitor our students' grades and will step in as needed to refer them to additional campus resources as we deem necessary.
We hope that, in time, your students will come to view us as their first-stop resource for any issues, concerns, or takeaways they may have about their time here. Whether your student is finishing their time at IMSA as a senior or has just begun their on-campus journey as a sophomore, rest assured that we will do everything in our power to look after them. The balance of mental health and professional development is something we value very highly, and we will make it an express goal that your students make their best efforts to attain said balance. Through our educational programming, social events, and everyday interactions, we intend to instill in your students a variety of real-world skills (ranging from job and interview preparedness to basic home maintenance and social interaction basics), alongside a holistic understanding of vital areas such as diversity, identity, self-care, health, wellness, and more.
When it comes to reaching out to us, email is by far the best way to get a hold of us. If you send an email to 04staff@imsa.edu, it will go to all three of us, and one of us will always get back to you within one business day. Otherwise, you can call the 1504 RC Office at 630-907-5401 during the times listed below:
Also of important note is the IMSA Residential Life Expectations and Consequences. We have already gone over these with all of our students, but it is helpful for parents and guardians to understand the rules we hold in for our students in order to guarantee their safety. Please take some time to review these Expectations and Consequences, so that if you ever contacted about one of them, you will have a baseline understanding.
The 04 Nations: A, B, C, and D
As you hopefully noticed from being in the hall, our Residential Student Leaders (RSLs) have done a wonderful job of decorating our common areas and hallways under the central theme of the American animated television series "Avatar: The Last Airbender" (as well as its sequel series "The Legend of Korra"). In the world of "Avatar," there lives four nations, each of which are populated by people with the ability to "bend" or telekinetically manipulate their nation's respective element - earth, air, fire, or water. As such, each of four wings of 1504 were assigned one of these elements, with 04A wing representing the Air Nomads, 04B wing representing the Earth Kingdom, 04C wing representing the Water Tribes, and 04D wing representing the Fire Nation.
Within each wing (aside from 1504 A-wing until a new RC is hired for the position), there is one RC as well at least one RSL who serves as a designated student leader for that wing, helping bridge the gap between students and RCs and assisting with programming and events.
In every subsequent blog post, we'll be dedicating this section to the specific events and programs happening in each wing of 1504, but for now, we'll use this opportunity to introduce the RCs and Residential Student Leaders of each wing in more detail:
1504 A-wing: The Air Nomads
RC: Currently Vacant
RSLs: Aiden and Jake:
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1504 B-wing: The Earth Kingdom
RC: Cynthia Smith
"Hi 1504!
I am Cynthia Smith, the RC for B-Wing. I am a first year RC; as well as a former track and field & Cross Country at IMSA. I am a Life-Extraordinaire with a very diverse background. I graduated from Clark Atlanta University with a Bachelors and Masters in Social Work. I am a licensed Social Worker and Licensed Realtor- very dynamic, I know!
I am excited for this school year to get to know the students and their families. Though my primary function is to ensure student safety and well-being, I am here as a resource and open ears. Please feel free to reach out via email or phone (email is the best way to reach me) if you ever have any questions, comments, or concerns. Peace!"
RSLs: Michael and Jaxon:
1504 C-wing: The Water Tribes
RC: Kylie Marsden
"Hello! My name is Kylie Marsden, and I am an RC in 1504 C Wing. This is my third year at IMSA and my second year at 1504. I am excited to engage with the students of IMSA again this year. You can see me as the advisor for SCRJ and Anime club. I enjoy painting, reading, crafting, thrifting, and I do lots of traveling. When I’m not engaging in work or my hobbies, I can be found watching TV with my cat.
The best way to reach me is via email, but I also utilize Google Chat if a quick message needs to be sent (kmarsden@imsa.edu)!"
RSLs: Ayan and Vignesh:
1504 D-wing: The Fire Nation
RC: Ethan Castro
"Hi, 1504! I am Ethan Castro, the RC in 1504 D-wing. This is my fifth school year at IMSA as an RC, and I am very excited to get to work with our students once again. Aside from being an RC, I have worked in IMSA's PROMISE and EXCEL programs as a staff member and even faculty member at times, so I would say that taking part in education is a passion of mine. I am also very interested in building, collecting, and displaying LEGO sets as well as learning about history (and even dabbling in some reenactment).
As with the other RCs, email is by far the best way to get a hold of me. I will always respond within at least one business day."
RSLs: Brian and Steven:
Convocation, Contracts, and Carnival: Foundations for the Year
The beginning of the IMSA school year is a time of setting the tone for the remainder of the year. Beyond the excitement of simply moving in to campus, the first few weeks of the school are rife with milestone events and celebrations marking the official beginning of a new year on the IMSA campus. Among these events is Convocation - the formal ceremony that marks the beginning of the school year. On the morning of Convocation, all students, staff, and faculty dress in our finest garments and listen to a variety of speeches from our colleagues, reflecting on what has brought us here and pondering what the coming school may have in store for us.
This year's Convocation ceremony featured statements from Chief Student Affairs Officer Ms. Katie Berger, Student Council President Marguerite D. (Class of 2024), IMSA President Dr. Evan M. Glazer, and Interim Principal and Chief Academic Officer Dr. Angela Rowley. In addition, a featured musical selection was performed on piano by Lily Z. (Class of 2025). Finally, this year's Keynote speaker was Jen Soriano (Class of 1993), a Filipinx writer and movement builder who has long worked at the intersection of grassroots organizing, narrative strategy, and art-driven social change.
The Convocation Ceremony gives us all the opportunity to reflect on how we arrived to this Academy, what our goals are for the coming year, and how we can best support each other along the way. It is a time of celebrating our achievements so far and looking ahead to the ones we have yet to realize, and it helps set a professional tone for our academic year.
Another way that 1504 set the tone for the school year was through our first night of Residence Life Programming on Tuesday, August 29. In this first installment, we invited 1504 to a hall-wide discussion on the topic of respect, and had them create a community document outlining what they agreed respect looks like in our hall. Afterwards, our RSLs took the conversation further by gathering their respective wings for follow-up discussions and drafting their Wing Constitutions, outlining a set of mutually-agreed upon rules for each wing community to follow.
It is the hope of IMSA Residence Life that having these conversations early on encouraged our students to really think about their communities and the roles they play in them. As needed, we will re-explore these conversations as our communities evolve, based on the needs of our students.
If Convocation marks the start of the school year with pomp and circumstance, then its corollary event, Carnival, marks it with festivity and merriment. After the first week of classes, IMSA brought its annual Carnival celebration to campus, allowing our entire campus community and visitors to partake in an afternoon of games, inflatable attractions, sweets and treats, and ample opportunities to unwind and bask in the warm sun and cool breezes (the weather was definitely on our side this year!).
RCs were also present for the duration of Carnival, helping run the various booths and attractions. If you were able to visit during Carnival, then you may have many of the RCs helping with the various attractions and refreshments. Hopefully you were able to visit during Carnival, but if not, the pictures above and below should give you the idea!
That's all from us for now! Stay tuned for further updates about what we get up to as a hall. In the meantime, feel free to reach out to us at 04staff@imsa.edu for anything you may need!
-The 1504 RCs
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