For Parents and Families
Welcome to our site for parents, families, and loved ones of our students who live on-campus!
First of all, thank you.
Thank you for trusting us with your student. Whether this is the first loved one you’re sending off to college or you’re a “seasoned pro” at this, we want you to know that we take the responsibility of housing your student seriously. We have passionate and dedicated students and staff working for Residential Life who are committed to make our residence halls to feel like a home away from home, a place where your student can live comfortably and thrive.
Through our residential curriculum, we will sponsor a wide variety of academic, social, and cultural opportunities to enhance the experience your student has while they stay with us. We approach our responsibilities as holistic and our goal is to not let the education stop at our front doors. The time your student spends in the residence halls will be a time of development and formation; they will carry the interpersonal and co-curricular skills developed in our buildings with them the rest of their lives. Our role is to support our residents academic and career pursuits by providing opportunities for students to become well-rounded, civically-engaged people.
How can I best support my student while they live in housing?
We want your student’s on-campus living experience to be a great one, but that doesn’t mean things will always be perfect. Transitioning to a new environment, homesickness, and conflict with roommates are just a few of the things you student could experience during their time living with us.
The best advice we have for when your student comes to you about their troubles is to refer them to our staff. We have trained staff, Resident Advisors and Residential Life Coordinators, who live in the buildings who want this to be a great experience for your student, but we can’t help with what we don’t know about. So please encourage your student to talk with one of our staff members to help figure out what the best course of action is for their situation.
You’ve been taking care of your student for a long time and you’ve done a great job! College is a time for them to learn and grow in their independence and to begin developing life-long skills such as communication, mediation, and self-reliance. We want to help your student develop these skills and our caring staff is here to guide them along their developmental journey.
Who can I talk to if I’m concerned about my student or their living situation?
In a lot of ways, we want the same thing you do: for your student to have a safe, fun, and successful time living with us. In that spirit, we want to partner with you to help ensure your student is doing well while they reside with us.
If you want to talk to a staff member about your student, please call or email one or both of the Residential Life Coordinators for your student’s building. They will be able to listen to your concerns and offer some guidance on our policies and procedures. We're always ready to listen, but please know there is only so much information they will be able to share about your student back to you.
The Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) is a federal law which protects the educational record and information about our students. Once your loved one becomes a student at SJSU, we have the obligation to protect their information at all times. Without any way to verify who you are or your current relationships status with your student over email or over the phone, we will always err on the side of providing less information to keep our residents safe.
Please don’t take this personally. We know you’ve put a lot of love and caring into your student and we’re grateful for the work you’ve done to make them this successful in life already. But in order for us to ensure our residents are as safe as possible, we will protect their status and information.
When you call, we will be happy to listen and follow-up on everything you share and we can talk generally about procedures and processes with you to help better your understanding of the work we do to support your student. Hearing from your student directly is always the most helpful and the way we can have the biggest impact, so we’ll encourage you to have your student come and talk with us. However, we might not be able to answer specific questions about a situation or how your student is doing if you contact us.
As you may be aware, SJSU also has Spartan Parent & Family programs and you can check their website for additional information and support.
