Thanks to a particularly bad week of storms in the spring of 2025, I associate tornadoes with “Phineas and Ferb.” It was just before finals, and Jenny Link, the Resident Advisor — or RA — of Lee and my roommate at the time, sat beside me, raincoat and rainboots on, storm key in one hand, phone in the other, waiting for sirens.
That week of storms interrupted homework, sleep and movie nights for everyone, but most notably, for RAs.
RAs wear many different hats throughout the year: hype crew, friend, mentor, arbiter and crisis manager. Tornadoes are a special — but not exactly rare — case, an emergency that involves an entire building all at once.
“As a student leader, I am responsible for my whole building of women,” Marie Tankersley, a junior biblical counseling major and RA, said.
Colin Harris, a senior communications major and freshman RA, described the process. Before the sirens go off, RAs are already working. They go and retrieve special keys to unlock all the doors in their building, try to determine where all their residents are going to be and finally, watch their phones for an alert.
“The fun happens right as the sirens are going off,” Harris said. “We will send a message out to our residents giving very detailed instructions, like, ‘Hey, go downstairs immediately,’ and then designate one person to text me individually who all is sheltering in that one room. And then, I have a checklist of every resident, and once I receive a text that they’re sheltering, I will check them off.”
During a tornado, RAs are responsible for knowing where everyone is all at once, sending texts and calling residents, alongside watching updates from the Resident Directors — the RDs.
“Everyone’s a bit flustered and panicked, and usually it’s raining very hard, so you know, I’m getting soaking wet, running up, knocking on all the doors, making sure everyone’s sheltering below and then frantically checking my phone,” Harris said.
For Harris, the hardest part is communication. In a dorm full of college boys, it can be hard to pin everyone down quickly, especially when not everyone takes tornadoes seriously.
“I have to do all that within a three-to-five-minute window, so it’s just rapid-fire texts,” Harris said. “That’s definitely the most stressful part.”
While some students don’t exactly take these storms seriously, others get nervous and their emotions run high as the sirens begin to blare. RAs have an entire building looking up to them in the middle of a crisis.
“It’s a hard thing to be like, ‘I’m easing all the anxiety that’s going on right now, but also I have no control over the situation,’” Tankersley said.
There are other students who might find themselves frustrated by being told what to do by a peer. But RAs have to protect students’ safety, erring on the side of caution.
“There’s a lot of down moments where we’re just waiting for [the RD’s] to give us the all clear,” Harris said. “That’s the part that people are most impatient about.”
For an RA, an emergency may strike at any moment, calling them away from homework, dinner and sometimes even other jobs.
“I’ve had to leave in the middle of class before, sprint back to my dorm. I’ve had to get up in the middle of Cobo and had to sprint back to my dorm. I’ve been off campus before and had to drive frantically,” Harris said. “In hindsight, I maybe should’ve stayed at work, but I was like, ‘I gotta make sure my guys are okay in my building.’”
Tankersley agreed, sharing an experience when she went through the whole process in wedding guest attire.
“I was going to a wedding. That was the plan. I had high heels on, and then the sirens went off. So, I ran, scurried all around, did the whole thing with my high heels on,” Tankersley said. “And then, I sat in the bathroom, and eventually the sirens stopped, and I drove to the wedding.”
When RAs take the job, they agree to give up some of their freedom, making sacrifices for their residents and knowing they might be called on at any hour of the day.
“The 24-hour aspect of it is very difficult and emotionally draining,” Tankersley said. “But also, this is the best experience I’ve had at Union, the most growth I’ve seen over my time at Union. I love people, so this is the best way to love people, in my opinion, on campus.”
RAs have a ton of responsibility, and constantly being on call is exhausting, especially during a week of heavy storms like the spring of 2025. Still, RAs make the best of it, doing what they do best and turning a crisis into a positive experience when they can. When you spend that long sheltering together, it can be a bonding experience, whether that’s watching “Phineas and Ferb,” playing games or just talking.
“There’s something fun about being in this situation at the same time. We’re all in this together, if you will,” Tankersley said.
For Harris, the 2025 storms gave him an excuse to share his favorite movie with his residents.
“We were in the living room watching ‘Lord of the Rings,’ and we were sheltering for hours at that point just because it was on and off, and we got through like half the extended edition of ‘Fellowship,’” Harris said. “It was a great one — a building event opportunity in a way.”
After being the roommate of an RA for a few years, I’ve learned that the best way to support my roommate is to move quickly, to follow instructions and to try and lighten the mood when I can.
“The best way you can be kind to your RA is literally to take tornadoes seriously,” Tankersley said.
