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During meals in campus dining halls and on evenings in Sunset Plaza, 9-year-old Andres can be seen eating with his mother or playing with students who have become his friends.

With a mother who is a faculty member in residence in Canyon Point, Andres has a vibrant social life and is good friends with the students living in his area, his mother said.

“Living on campus is fun because there are basketball courts, tennis courts (and a) swimming pool. There is a cafeteria I get to eat at every night and the student leaders are awesome,” Andres said.

Marjorie Orellana, a professor in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, is one of 17 faculty members living in residence halls for the 2006-2007 year.

Faculty members are chosen to live on the Hill by the Office of Residential Life and are assigned to a specific residential community. There, they cultivate relationships with students through educational programming by mentoring students, according to the ORL Web site. These faculty members come from many different schools and departments on campus.

Orellana said Andres has had a good experience on campus because students have taken the time to become friends with him.

“He’ll see them and call to them across the plaza,” Orellana said.

Robert Rhoads, a faculty member in residence at Canyon Point and associate professor in the school of education, said that by living on campus, faculty members are able to develop bonds with students without the pressure of the classroom.

“Living on campus gives you the feeling that you are almost at a small liberal arts college,” Rhoads said. “You have direct contact with the overall education of the student.”

But based on faculty members’ experiences, the education given is more than just academic – it is cultural as well.

Roads said that last spring, he and his wife invited students to their apartment in Courtside to celebrate the Chinese Spring Festival. They treated students to chrysanthemum tea brought to the United States from China and taught students about the history of the festival by putting up informational posters on the walls of their apartment.

For some faculty members, living on the Hill provides a chance to see a section of the UCLA student population that they would not see normally.

“I mostly teach graduate students,” Orellana said, “so to me it’s really exciting to work with undergraduates and see a fuller picture of life at UCLA.”

Rajeev Jain, a faculty member in residence for Dykstra Hall and a professor of electrical engineering, holds office hours in the second-floor lounge of Dykstra, where he helps students with homework twice a week.

“I’d say the first thing that has made this a wonderful experience for me was getting to know non-engineering students,” Jain said.

The main purpose of the Faculty in Residence program is to create academic life on the Hill, according to the ORL Web site.

“I feel that we have learned to separate school from our lives. ... We go to school and we leave home behind,” Orellana said. “But that’s a dichotomy we should be breaking. Here on the Hill we have the opportunity to bring the two together.”

Orellana said one of her programming interests is to connect UCLA students with the larger community, which includes educating students about current and historical events.

Along with other faculty living on campus, Orellana sponsored a showing of a film in Sunset Village this week about the Vietnam War.

Jain has also helped organize trips to UCLA’s Japanese garden, a staff retreat to an archery range and outings to ethnic restaurants where students and staff talk about the history of the different ethnic foods. Last week, Jain put on a seminar about how iPods work.

Rhoads said that for the professors who live on the Hill, the Faculty in Residence program not only serves to cultivate interaction between students and faculty, but also between faculty members from different schools and departments.

“The ... program allows me to see professors with whom I would not normally have contact,” Rhoads said.

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