ACUHO-I is committed to the creation and dissemination of knowledge about campus housing and the broader issues that impact the post-secondary experience.
A funded research grant program was created to support ACUHO-I’s goal of cultivating knowledge resources for members. The aim of this program is to encourage scholars and practitioners to conduct high-quality research in support of ACUHO-I’s research agenda priorities and the Future of the Profession imperatives.
Annually, ACUHO-I solicits grant proposals from faculty, practitioners, and graduate students within and outside of the United States. Through support from the ACUHO-I Foundation, accepted research grant proposals receive grant funds up to $7,000 (USD).
After a comprehensive review process, ACUHO-I is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2025 Funded Research Grant.
Examining Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Resident Assistant Training in Contested Times
Principal Investigator: Lauren Irwin, PhD – University of Tennessee Knoxville
Residence halls are consequential spaces – places where students learn, build relationships, and rest (Blimling, 2015). For those three million or so students who live on-campus (Graham et al., 2021), their experiences in residential spaces can powerfully shape their sense of belonging, retention and persistence, academic success, and self-exploration (Erb et al., 2015; Mayhew et al., 2016; Schudde, 2011). However, residence halls can also be spaces where students, particularly minoritized students, experience microaggressions and marginalization (e.g., Foste & Irwin, 2023; Kortegast, 2017).
Residence halls rely on labor, often from resident assistants (RAs), to support vital functions like policy enforcement, crisis response, community building, resource referral, and the creation of inclusive spaces (Boone et al., 2016; Early & Whitney, 2017). While there are notable critiques about the intensity and breadth of responsibilities RAs are expected to fulfill, campuses continue to employ RAs as peer leaders and educators. To ensure RAs are prepared to carry out their job duties, most RAs experience some form of training. Training may occur as an RA course, intensive week-long training in the summer, ongoing in-services, or through regular staff meetings (Irwin et al., 2024). Some residence life departments use a combination of these forms. Given the time and energy staff and students dedicate to ongoing RA training, it is no surprise that scholarship has examined common training topics, student learning outcomes, and student satisfaction. Surprisingly, little scholarship has examined what diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) content is facilitated in RA training or how that content relates to RAs’ roles.
This study uses organizational perspectives on DEI in higher education, including Thomas’ (2020) notion of diversity regimes, within the context of increased backlash against DEI work, to examine how campus and political contexts shape the form and function of DEI content in RA training across multiple campuses. This study uses critical qualitative multi-site case study design (Pasque et al., 2017; Stake, 2005) to pursue the following questions: (1) How are institutional commitments to DEI reflected in RA training? In what ways do residence life departments facilitate learning about DEI? (2) In what ways do residence life departments mimic approaches to integrating DEI content in RA training? How does campus context shape training goals, approaches, and content?; and (3) How do larger political and policy contexts (e.g., state anti-DEI legislation) shape the inclusion of DEI content and processes in RA training? This study addresses two aspects of the Future of the Profession: Belonging and Learning as an Organization by examining how RA training can adapt and change to ensure that residential communities can function as inclusive communities, even as DEI work is limited and undermined.
The Geography of On-Campus Friendship
Principal Investigator: Benjamin Meagher, PhD – Hope College
Undergraduate students are at a heightened risk of a number of mental health challenges, with rates of anxiety and depressive symptoms increasing annually. Critically, social support represents an important buffer to these challenges, producing enhanced resiliency in response to stressors. For colleges and universities, fostering social connection among students is therefore an important strategic goal, and a critical student outcome for those working in residential life. One strategy for accomplishing this has been through the design of physical places, with institutions spending billions of dollars annually on non-academic building maintenance and construction. But how do these places actually relate to the social lives of students? Drawing on ecological theorizing within the fields of social and environmental psychology, the goal of the proposed project is to investigate how social spaces on a college campus are associated with particular friendship behaviors and functions.
The grant will support a set of four empirical studies that explore (a) how spaces on campus vary in terms of their behavioral opportunities, and (b) how different types of friendships emerge across these locations. Studies 1a-c will offer a functional assessment of on-campus, social settings. Participants will be presented with images of places on campus and asked to: (a) list behaviors they could do with their friends there (Study 1a), (b) rate the adequacy of the setting for those behaviors (Study 1b), and (c) sort the settings in terms of their similarity (Study 1c). Through a series of statistical data-reduction techniques, Study 1a and 1b will reveal the basic categories of social affordances across campus, and Study 1c will identify how the spaces themselves are categorized in terms of their social functions. In Study 2, undergraduate participants will report the frequency with which they interact with friends across a number of on-campus locations. Employing multilevel latent profile analysis, we will seek to identify the particular friendship types that exist on campus, in terms of where interaction takes place and the benefits individuals derive from that relationship. Taken together, this analysis will offer a framework that college and university departments (e.g., residential life, physical plant) can use to evaluate the functional range of on-campus spaces available (or lacking) to students and assess what design decisions might be needed to promote different friendship benefits across the student body.
Dorm Life and Mental Health: Impact on International Students’ Image of the University
Principal Investigator: Corey A. Ross, Assistant Professor of Marketing – University of Guam
Other Team Members: Mijeong Park, Graduate Student – University of Guam
A public university located in a U.S. territory in the Pacific region serves a culturally diverse student population, including residents of surrounding islands, students from the U.S. mainland, and individuals from over 35 foreign countries. Due to the exceedingly high cost of off-campus housing, many international and non-local students rely on the university’s on-campus residence halls. However, growing concerns about student mental health—particularly among dormitory residents—have emerged in recent years.
International students living on campus often face a combination of academic pressure, cultural adjustment, and social isolation. These stressors, when compounded by inadequate dormitory conditions or limited access to support services, can significantly impact psychological well-being. Poor mental health is closely linked to lower academic performance, reduced engagement, and increased dropout risk—especially among international students navigating unfamiliar cultural and institutional environments.
The mental health of international students also has broader implications. As informal ambassadors for the institution and the surrounding region, their lived experiences shape how others perceive both the university and its host community. If marked by distress or a lack of support, their stories may discourage future enrollment, affecting both educational and economic goals for the region.
The university’s on-campus housing accommodates over 200 students and serves as a lifeline for those facing financial and logistical barriers to off-campus living. Yet anecdotal reports suggest that dormitory residents often feel isolated, stressed, or emotionally unsupported, particularly when living conditions fall short of expectations for safety, comfort, and community. The limited budget allocated to residence halls has made it difficult to proactively address these concerns. In this context, evidence-based planning guided by research is critical. Recognizing this urgent need, the university’s school of business and the office overseeing residence life have partnered to initiate a collaborative study focused on improving dormitory student satisfaction and well-being.
This study investigates how foreign students form an overall image of the university based on satisfaction shaped by their mental health. Specifically, it explores how dormitory life—including dorm culture, perceived quality of amenities, congruency between ideal and actual ambiance, and dorm safety (including policy enforcement)—affects mental well-being.
Using a quantitative research design, surveys will be distributed to international dormitory residents. Multiple linear regression will be used to examine how dorm-related factors influence mental health, and structural equation modeling (SEM) will test how mental health mediates the relationship between dorm experience and institutional image.
This research aligns with ACUHO-I’s Future of the Profession Imperatives, particularly Strengthening Mental Health, Increasing Belonging, and Communicating Campus Housing’s Value. Findings will inform actionable improvements in housing policy and support services, with implications for student retention, inclusive residential life, and the university’s global reputation.
Questions about the Funded Research Grant or ACUHO-I Research? Contact research@acuho-i.org for assistance.
The ACUHO-I Funded Research Grant Program is supported by the ACUHO-I Foundation.
