By Casey Roepke ‘21
News Editor
In an effort to continue cultivating community within its remote student body, Mount Holyoke recently introduced Virtual Cohorts into the Residential Life virtual programming. Student participants applied to join one of the cohorts supervised by a virtual community ambassador. According to the job description, a VCA “is an essential member of the administrative staff of Residential Life and plays a critical role following the College’s shift to remote learning.”
“I like to think of [it] as a community advisor-like role that has been adapted to meet some of the new demands of a remote learning environment,” Salina Hussain ’21, a VCA for the first-year experience virtual community, said. “Similarly, a Virtual Cohort can be thought of as a group of people brought together by something shared, be it a common hobby, identity or even desire to experience something different — sort of like the remote version of LLCs [Living Learning Communities].”
As the Mount Holyoke News previously reported in fall 2020, there are a variety of Virtual Cohort themes, including the first-year experience, art, outdoors and cohorts dictated by geographical time zones.
Hussain, who leads the first-year experience cohort, said her role has introduced her to new ways of virtual connection.
“As a VCA, my role might be considered … the ‘glue’ or ‘facilitator’ of the community,” she said. “We have a variety of students interested in joining Virtual Cohorts, all from different places in the world, with different experiences and stories. It might seem on the outside that there are a lot more differences that divide us instead of commonalities that unite us, but my job as a VCA is precisely to be able to learn more about individuals in the community so I can host events and encourage networking in a group of students that allow them to find people to build community with.”
Hussain has worked in ResLife as a community advisor and senior community advisor since her sophomore year but applied this past term for a position as a VCA because of the new job responsibilities for residential student staff.
“I noticed in the job description that the VCA role places much less emphasis on following up on policy enforcement and violations and more emphasis on community building and cohesion,” Hussain said. “I found this shift very appealing because my least favourite part of working in ResLife in the past was being an extension of the administration in ensuring no violations of College policy and rules.”
Hussain feels that the importance of a community leader for first-years is doubled in virtual times.
“I can’t imagine what it must be like to have to start one’s first year of college without the ability to really connect with people in person,” she said. “This is sort of what has fueled me to think of ways to help people find a community from which they can draw strength when the going gets tough, and this is also what made me want to be a facilitator of community even in a virtual environment in the first place.”