[akiddoc]

Back in the day, which is long past 30 years ago, the RA was rarely seen, usually leaving his room or returning to it, but never out with the inhabitants of the dorm.  Poker games, serious bridge playing, all for money of course. took place 30 ft from his door.  Flasks came out of pockets and the contents emptied into cokes.  
Some how we all found our advisors, scheduled classes, went to them when we liked them and tended not to go when we didn't and just did the reading and papers, unless of course the Prof was one of few who took roll. We pretty much made all of own decisions without unwanted input from the University.  We mostly all graduated, moved on with our lives and years later still looked back on the Stanford years as some of the bests of our lives. Doesn't sound like is the case now.

My experience was very similar to yours. Freshman year, I lived next door to the RA. I think we stabilized him more than visa-versa. There weren't many interactions, and none of them were "significant". Our "tutor" worked the night shift at SLAC and slept during the day, so we never saw him. When SLAC first opened, they could only operate the beam at night. It took too much power (supposedly) to operate in the daytime. Interestingly, I do see him now occasionally, more than I ever did then.

We saw our RAs all the time. And they not only saw us drinking in the lounge, in the hallways, or in our rooms with the doors open, they were often drinking with us.  I think they even made the Ernie's run for our big dorm keg party.  

Perhaps they thought there was only so much trouble a bunch of nerdy SLE freshmen could get themselves into and so they wanted to show us how it's done.  

The only time I remember hearing about a dorm staff member crossing the line was when one offered an underclassman girl a drink behind closed doors. He lost his staff position for that.

In later years in dorms that were not all freshmen (and eventually were co-ed) there were RAs that operated like you describe, more or less. Most of them didn't actually participate in the parties, but they did make Ernie's runs to facilitate them. They all had their own lives and friends, so they often were absent or involved is a "small group" party of their own. I think they felt their prominent presence at dorm events might cast a damper on them (and they also might have wanted plausible deniability if "something" happened). In any case they were absolutely certain we knew how to get into trouble and they also believed we would mostly refrain from doing so (and step up to help those who accidentally did so without involving "the administration").

I was an RA for a quarter. I was almost never "there" as I had lots going on academically and in fact quit as an RA after one quarter because it was obvious I just didn't have the time to do even a minimal job.

45 years ago, the RA for my freshman dorm helped arrange for kegs and set up parties. Every party on campus had alcohol. Everyone knew it. Even President Lyman would come to the dorms for wine and cheese socials. Our RA had one rule: "don't do anything stupid." We policed ourselves pretty well. Stopped drunken dorm mates from leaving the building, stopped them from driving, etc. Our RA was very visible. Gave a lot of good advice. I followed him to Yale Med School, actually.

[akiddoc]

Back in the day, which is long past 30 years ago, the RA was rarely seen, usually leaving his room or returning to it, but never out with the inhabitants of the dorm.  Poker games, serious bridge playing, all for money of course. took place 30 ft from his door.  Flasks came out of pockets and the contents emptied into cokes.  
Some how we all found our advisors, scheduled classes, went to them when we liked them and tended not to go when we didn't and just did the reading and papers, unless of course the Prof was one of few who took roll. We pretty much made all of own decisions without unwanted input from the University.  We mostly all graduated, moved on with our lives and years later still looked back on the Stanford years as some of the bests of our lives. Doesn't sound like is the case now.

My experience was very similar to yours. Freshman year, I lived next door to the RA. I think we stabilized him more than visa-versa. There weren't many interactions, and none of them were "significant". Our "tutor" worked the night shift at SLAC and slept during the day, so we never saw him. When SLAC first opened, they could only operate the beam at night. It took too much power (supposedly) to operate in the daytime. Interestingly, I do see him now occasionally, more than I ever did then.

We saw our RAs all the time. And they not only saw us drinking in the lounge, in the hallways, or in our rooms with the doors open, they were often drinking with us.  I think they even made the Ernie's run for our big dorm keg party.  

Perhaps they thought there was only so much trouble a bunch of nerdy SLE freshmen could get themselves into and so they wanted to show us how it's done.  

The only time I remember hearing about a dorm staff member crossing the line was when one offered an underclassman girl a drink behind closed doors. He lost his staff position for that.

In later years in dorms that were not all freshmen (and eventually were co-ed) there were RAs that operated like you describe, more or less. Most of them didn't actually participate in the parties, but they did make Ernie's runs to facilitate them. They all had their own lives and friends, so they often were absent or involved is a "small group" party of their own. I think they felt their prominent presence at dorm events might cast a damper on them (and they also might have wanted plausible deniability if "something" happened). In any case they were absolutely certain we knew how to get into trouble and they also believed we would mostly refrain from doing so (and step up to help those who accidentally did so without involving "the administration").

I was an RA for a quarter. I was almost never "there" as I had lots going on academically and in fact quit as an RA after one quarter because it was obvious I just didn't have the time to do even a minimal job.

45 years ago, the RA for my freshman dorm helped arrange for kegs and set up parties. Every party on campus had alcohol. Everyone knew it. Even President Lyman would come to the dorms for wine and cheese socials. Our RA had one rule: "don't do anything stupid." We policed ourselves pretty well. Stopped drunken dorm mates from leaving the building, stopped them from driving, etc. Our RA was very visible. Gave a lot of good advice. I followed him to Yale Med School, actually.