Hoey Helps Students Find Their Place
By Kelly Saavedra
Joshua Hoey’s unique approach to housing helps students find their place at Carnegie Mellon University.
Hoey, who has been CMU’s assignments coordinator for Housing Services for three years, says it’s an exciting time to be part of the team because of all the new growth happening on campus.
“Over the next three years, CMU is scheduled to either re-open or construct three brand new housing facilities,” he said. “If you’re a current first-year student, you’ll actually have a new housing option available to you every year that you’re here.”
Hoey’s first priority is to ensure successful room selection for students, but he brings much more to the job than an ability to “count heads and beds.”
“This position appealed to me because it was very unique in the fact that it was a balance between administrative savvy and relational skills,” he said.
Hoey’s prior work as the director of Residence Life at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh, as well as his own experience at Grove City College, enable him to relate well to first-year students as they adapt to college life.
“In my first year of college, I thought about transferring every day,” he said. “High school was easy for me, but the academics in college were more challenging than I had bargained for. I was also on the football team, but that wasn’t giving me what I wanted socially in terms of feeling a sense of connectedness or belonging.”
A residence hall director noticed Hoey kept his door open a lot and was always warm and friendly toward people. He suggested to Hoey that he would make a great resident assistant (RA), so he gave it a try.
Becoming an RA brought out the best in Hoey. His leadership and developmental skills flourished. He dropped football, changed majors and started getting up early to get work done instead of saving it for the end of the night when there were more distractions.
“Having a mentor and being committed to overcoming the obstacles was a transformative experience for me,” Hoey said. “Taking small incremental steps in the right direction and being willing to ask for help are so important. I went from being on the social periphery and struggling academically to being on scholarship my last two years and really feeling like I had my finger on the pulse of campus life.”
Students at CMU often seek out Hoey for his advice, and he says working with them is the best part of his job.
“I just watched our new campaign video ‘Make Possible,’ where you can see some of the things our students are doing. They are ridiculously talented. It’s just wild!” Hoey said.
“It’s what I love about working at a university — this world of ideas, of possibility. It helps keep me young.”
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