USAO welcomed a new Housing Operations Director, Mark Moultrup, in early March. Moultrup has a vast knowledge about what he does and is excited to be a part of USAO.
He was first inspired to apply for the position after the previous Housing Director, Dr. Delton Gordon, reached out to him. Moultrup was thrilled when he received the call, as being Housing Director is his dream job, and he felt this was an incredible opportunity. After touring the campus, Moultrup knew this is where he wanted to be.
Moultrup brings with him a vision for the USAO campus life.
“My vision for housing is to build an experience. One of my biggest expressions is ‘the people make the place,” Moultrup said. “So you can have all the best bells and whistles and amenities, but if you don’t have the right people working there it doesn’t matter what you have.”
He wants the student experience to be meaningful. With that in mind, he is currently working on the Residential Experience Model, or Residential Curriculum. In doing so, Moultrup was inspired by his own housing experience.
He attended Central Michigan University for his undergraduate education and was excited about the experience. However, after losing his father and facing roommate issues, he almost dropped out of college.
“There was one day I was having a particularly tough day, and I was sitting in the lobby with my head on the table and my RA came up and asked me, ‘do you need to talk to somebody?’ They spent hours that night talking with me about everything I was going through and how I was feeling,” Moultrup said.
This inspired him to be a Resident Advisor (RA) himself, and to later pursue working in Housing and Student Life. Moultrup wants to foster this type of environment at USAO, where RAs can make these connections with their residents. In building up the Residential Curriculum, one of the important factors is to have every RA be connected to 100% of their residents each month. He understands that, while not every resident is going to need or want to talk with their RA, he wants to ensure residents know the option is there.
“There will most likely be a time where they have a hard time and it’s so important to build that experience for our students,” Moultrup said.
Moultrup has plans to implement more activities based on gathering student opinions planned for next semester.
“At other places that I’ve been, I’ve done something called Coffee and Conversations where I take some instant coffee, or a Keurig, to each of the resident halls and hang out in the lobby with coffee and donuts and a small half sheet with three questions on it,” Moultrup said.
Those questions are meant to bring awareness to student’s opinions on living on campus and what they would like to see on campus in the future.
Moultrup believes that the campus experience is valuable because it brings students closer to campus resources. He believes students make a big impact on the campus and wants to continue to create an environment that is engaging for them. His goal in building the housing experience lies within understanding the students and their needs.
“We’re here for you, we want to help you, and we want you to have a good time. Don’t be afraid to reach out. Our RAs are students, both of the housing coordinators have graduated from here, they understand what makes USAO special,” Moultrup said.
Whitley Brown is a third-year communication major at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma.
