3-Tiered Oversight

There are three sets of people who stay in the dorm with the students.  The Head Dormitory Supervisor, Resident Assistants employed by Wake Forest University and Resident Assistants employed by Wake Forest Debate.

The Head Dormitory Supervisor, Samantha Rippetoe is someone who has experience working with students in this capacity before.  This is her second year at Wake Forest in the role.  Prior to being at Wake Forest, she was a lead Dormitory supervisor at the collegiate level at Humboldt State University.  She also possesses a background in debate so understanding student needs is not a problem.

Resident Assistants employed by Wake Forest are there to make sure all protocols are followed.  They are extensively trained by Wake Forest University in both crisis identification and crisis mitigation.  They report directly to the WFU Summer Conferences and not to the debate workshop.  While they rarely interact with students, it is good to know that students have an extra level of safety provided.

Residence Assistants employed by Wake Debate perform the majority of the dormitory duties.  They will be at the front line of bed checks, wake-up calls and resolving any inter-personal disputes that arise.  There is someone on-call 24 hours a day, and we have both male and non-male RAs on duty to make sure every student has someone they feel comfortable with. We place emphasis on making sure the students settle into dorm life as much as possible, as we believe that sleeping well and enough is critical to their successful learning during workshop activities. RAs are also teachers at our workshop, and their duties in the evening include talking over the following day's debates with the individual teams.  Unlike other workshops, we do not employ those who just graduated high school.

Debate Breaks

The students will have a full day of instruction.  In the evening, they will be supervised, but breaks from debate are needed.  Movie night, dinner from Chipotle, trips to a local art museum and a 150 year old gardens, guest speakers on performance, game night, "old-timer" debates, ultimate, ....Our dorm and instructional staff work hard to make sure that students get the balance they need to be truly healthy people.

Hanging Rock State Park