RA Spotlight: Moji Brittingham ’22

Senior Moji Brittingham’s college experience has brought him right back to where he started: Augustine Hall. This time, Brittingham serves as the RA for Augustine’s first-year residents, and he brings years of experience and knowledge with him.

“I really wanted to be an RA because of my first-year RA,” said Brittingham. “I was a first-year in Augustine as well, so it’s really been full circle. My RA had such a useful wealth of knowledge and really helped me find my place at Saint Mary’s. Any question that I asked, he knew the answer to. My RA totally helped me figure out where my place was, how to have a plan, and how to make something of my education.”

“A resident advisor isn’t just a glorified hall monitor. What we really are is a resource. We are people who have experienced college life, academics, social life, and everything at Saint Mary’s. So, we are here as a resource for you and to make sure that you’re being safe, following the rules, and all that.”

Brittingham shared how being a first-year RA challenged him to balance his time between his residents’ needs and his own academic responsibilities. “You need to be on campus and confined to your room with the door open during certain times. That doesn’t seem like a big responsibility, but it means working with other students and sometimes putting your own needs on the back burner for a while.… You have to be able to take care of yourself and take care of 130 other students sometimes all by yourself. It’s a very selfless job,” he said. 

“One of my residents saw me in the hall and was like, ‘Moji you take classes here? I thought you were just an RA!’ and I thought that was so funny. We have our own stuff, and they forget because we really are their go-to for advice.”

Although his RA duties keep him busy, Brittingham enjoys how the tight-knit community at Saint Mary’s allows him to create connections with his residents. “I think the beauty of SMC is its size…. You can really develop a relationship with your professors and your RA. My friends who go to other colleges talk about how it feels like their RAs are just out to get them. But we actually have relationships with our students and residents. We bake for them, do events with them to help build our community—whereas at big schools, that aspect might be lost. SMC is huge on community, and that’s part of what inspired me to be an RA.”

“I really love the community and that’s one of the main reasons I came to SMC. Saint Mary’s wants you to succeed, and I want to succeed. We all lift each other up, and we can all do it together.”

To learn more about living on campus, visit the Student Life website.