As the ethics of unpaid labor are increasingly debated, the roles of student leaders on college campuses have taken center stage. First-year Orientation Leaders (OLs) and student Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs) are both positions that are integral to the functioning of the campus community, but both remain unpaid. Both positions work long hours, often at high physical and emotional expense, leading some students to question the ethics of their unpaid positions, and others to ask how it affects the diversity of students in those roles.

OLs lead orientation trips, including Adirondack Adventure (AA), a four-day wilderness camping trip; Exploration Adventure (XA), where students “explore a theme or topic while learning more about the local community and central New York”; and Outreach Adventure (OA), where students participate in a service project in the area surrounding Hamilton.

Hamilton takes pride in its orientation program and the positive impact that it has on students. Since 2015, the orientation experience has become more accessible as the College removed the cost of those trips and made them mandatory, according to Tessa Chefalo, Assistant Dean of Students for Student Engagement and Director of XA.

OLs can shape new students’ transition to life at college. “[My OLs made me] really love Hamilton, and made me very excited to be here for the next four years,” said Christian Hernandez ’24, a former OA leader, “They were really big role models for me, and that was really what I wanted to be for other people and for incoming classes.”

Chefalo agreed that OLs help students feel comfortable at Hamilton, “I think all of the orientation leaders play a really critical role in setting the tone for what Hamilton is and what it can be…[OLs are] not only in a position to talk about and reflect what [they] have seen at Hamilton or what Hamilton is now, but also to make Hamilton what [they] want it to be.”

However, when these positions are unpaid, they can end up excluding individuals who rely on compensation.

Quinn Brown ’24, an AA leader and former intern who helped coordinate hiring and logistics for AA trips, said that, “The biggest issue with not getting paid that I’ve come across is that we have some people who are fantastic [that] cannot make it work because they can’t take three weeks off out of their summer that aren’t paid.”

The lack of accessibility to the position due to the pay may contribute to a lack of diversity within the OL role.

“The biggest issue I see with Adirondack Adventure… is that we lack a significant amount of diversity. It tends to be students from white, wealthy backgrounds,” said Brown. “If we’re supposed to be also giving a good representation of what the school is as a whole and introducing these students to college, we should have a leader group that accurately represents the student body.”

Hernandez spoke about the importance of diversifying the OL cohort and how a lack of diversity can negatively impact participants. “Being a person of color, and one of the very few orientation leaders of color, it is disappointing to see how little representation there is,” he said. “I’ve had a lot of participants that come from marginalized communities, and they have a harder time adapting to this campus.”

Madison Harland

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26, an XA leader, said that lack of pay and its ensuing effect on staff diversity has a tangible result on the experiences of students, especially those from marginalized communities: “[It] is really unfortunate because the students on the trips that need support and need to see people with lived experiences that are more similar to their own are the ones that come to Hamilton without the level of privilege and whiteness that so many people have here.”

EMTs, similarly, play an important role by ensuring the well-being of the Hamilton community. According to the Hamilton website, the job of an EMT is to “provide immediate medical assistance to anyone in need on campus” by being available to “promptly provide first aid, administer basic medical care, and assess the urgency of medical situations.” When a student needs emergency medical care, EMTs are responsible for addressing immediate concerns and assessing further steps for action. Ally Berkowitz

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25, Captain for the Hamilton College Emergency Medical Service (HCEMS), explained her role. “We help people in times when they’re really often in great distress . . . we know what to do, we know who to call.”

EMTs have also expressed how the lack of pay can be a barrier to the position for students with limited time or financial resources. Bailey Black

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24 described the financial barriers to joining the program. “You have to pay to go to a class before you start, which requires people to have a significant amount of money.” Black said that while the classes are reimbursed after years of service, “not everyone has access to that kind of money just lying around to be able to do that…It requires you to have some financial security, which means that not everyone who wants to do it can feasibly do it.” Hannah Singer

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24, EMT Captain, echoes Black’s point: “There are people who have come to me and told me that they would love to join HCEMS but they need a job that pays on campus. Therefore, being an EMT on campus is not equitable because people who need jobs that pay are not able to [be EMTs].”

These discussions surrounding pay for student positions, particularly concerning how it impacts prospective applicants, are also taking place at a level above students.

Amy James, Director of Community Outreach and of OA, acknowledged how the unpaid structure of the position impacts the applicant pool. “Students will have to stop working about a week early in order to do this unpaid work. There are some students who can’t really afford to do that” said James. “We initially talked about [payment] as a possibility when we were talking about trying to recruit a more inclusive leader group so that students who are coming on campus would see a diversity of faces.”

Andrew Jillings, Director of Outdoor Leadership and AA, expressed the importance of hiring a more diverse OL staff as ‘[they] would get better leaders,” and added that, “I think the current leaders would say that they would welcome a broader [array] of leader applications.”

On top of existing diversity efforts, including prompting leaders to consider how to make their trips an inclusive space, the Directors reiterated their belief in paying OLs. Jillings said that, “If a way was presented to us that we could pay students, we would, very happily indeed.” He added that there are rewards to the work beyond wages, “We believe that there’s more compensation [to this gig] than pay–we are happy to offer the job without pay. We would prefer to offer the job with pay.”

This begs the question: if OL Directors are in favor of paying students, why do OLs remain unpaid? Many OLs are under the impression that during the hiring process, supervisors seek students motivated not by money but by the opportunity to assist participants.

“The reason that the Directors lay out for not wanting to pay us is that they want people to not be motivated by money,” said Harland “and they want people who are really in it for the kids.”

Brown echoed this rumor: “The one [benefit of not paying OLs] that gets sort of leveled usually is that it will attract people who are only doing it for the money, which I think is ridiculous because nobody gets paid and would get paid enough for that to be a major reason.”

However, the supervisors dispelled these claims. “I can see that perspective and I would reject it,” said Jillings. Chefalo agreed: “I think we do want people who are motivated to do this position, but I don’t see that as mutually exclusive from compensation,” she said, adding that, “Just because you’re being compensated doesn’t mean ‘well, now I don’t care.’”

Like orientation leaders, some EMTs described efforts to get paid which involved talking to administrators about the topic. Singer recounts her conversations with Chris Card, Vice President and Dean of Students. “I’ve been talking to Chris Card about it since last spring, but we haven’t really gotten anywhere yet so that is pretty frustrating.” She added, “Dean Card was very much in favor when I spoke to him last spring. He listened to my concerns and he told me it’s important that we work something out, whether that’s room and board, or some sort of stipend.”

It is unclear where David Goldman, the Director of HCEMS, currently stands on the issue since he declined an interview with

The Spectator

. Singer said that, “I think he has tried [to support student pay] and has been shut down.” Berkowitz added, “I don’t think [Goldman] is opposed to it whatsoever, but I think he is cautionary because he may have to change parts of the organization to be paid.”

The logistics of paying EMTs is not as simple as flipping a switch: “My understanding is that their issue with us being paid is a matter of overtime because we work a lot of hours,” said Singer, who has raised the issue with administrators before. “We would no longer be a volunteer organization,” she said.

The character of EMTs as a volunteer organization makes pay a complicated issue. “I know that when I joined EMS, the people who were seniors at the time, were very passionate that it shouldn’t be paid, and said that if it was paid, then people would want to join for the money and wouldn’t necessarily want to do the job or be invested in the job,” Black said. She continued to echo the logistical concerns with EMT pay: “Also paying us for on-call, if they paid us hourly, that would just be too much money because we’re on call so often. The logistics of paying us was challenging.”

Most EMTs appreciate that HCEMS is a volunteer organization with a lower frequency of calls compared to an external EMS organization. Depending on the necessary changes to the structure of the organization, not all EMTs want compensation if it means drastic changes. Berkowitz describes the benefits of not being paid, “Some people do this for volunteer hours because you need that for [Physician Assistant] schools. It started as a volunteer organization, just for students to do their part in the community.” Berkowitz said, “I would prefer to see, laid out, what changes would be required for getting paid,” and suggested alternatives to hourly pay, “Ideally if nothing can change, but we got some sort of compensation, whether that’s even being a quarter credit class or housing or food or a single lump sum of money without changing the organization, I would be very happy with that.”

EMT Bobbi Roca ’24 proposes an alternative solution where compensation is optional. “Personally, with my PA school application, I think having this as a volunteer opportunity is great, but I would prefer getting paid be an option.”

EMT leaders also see potential career benefits from their position.“There’s also a lot of stress [for] pre-med students to do something that stands out and to do something that prepares you for med school. Med school applications are really intense. I think there are a lot of people who join EMS because they want that experience” said Black.

Roca explained that the EMT’s desire for pay has tended to stall, “I think any push for [compensation] has mostly stayed between the officers and David Goldman. Within the rest of the EMTs, there hasn’t been any sort of movement.” She added, “Most of us are only working as EMTs for two or three years, and then we’re off…Because we’re done being EMTs on campus after three years max, we’re kind of like, ‘okay, we’ll just stick it out for the three years.’”

Logistical challenges pose a similar barrier for Orientation Leader pay. “We believe that this has been discussed [by] senior staff,” said Jillings. Chefalo added, “I think I’ve talked about the logistics a little bit with Human Resources or the Student Employment Office…We have delved into all the very complicated questions about…if you pay somebody, right, there’s a whole bunch of rules and regulations that come along with that.”

James posed the questions: “What’s overtime? Like eight hours is normal. How do you pay for the fact that you’re pretty much on duty 24/7?” Chefalo added, “What counts as working?…Is sitting around the campfire at eight o’clock a working hour or is it not?”

The time commitment necessary to be an OL or EMT is an often-cited reason for compensation. HCEMS, being a provider of medical services, acts as one of the few positions on campus that operate 24 hours a day and seven days a week while classes are in session. Singer said they usually work around 17 hours a week. “If our radio goes off, we are required to go to that scene and provide medical attention. Sometimes that means staying up late. Sometimes that means getting up early.” Berkowitz however, appreciated the flexibility of these hours: “I don’t think it’s too much of a time suck in the day, especially because you can go about your life.”

OLs also work around the clock over the duration of their trips. Starting from a full week of work that can run for 12 hours a day, followed by five days at the end of the summer with their new students. That timeline can be stressful and challenging.

Harland said that, “There’s so many situations that you are just guaranteed to have to deal with as an orientation leader.” When asked if she felt like she got adequate training for these experiences on her trip, she responded, “I feel like they gave us as much training as they could in the time required, but I also didn’t want more training because it would have just been more time out of my life that wasn’t paid.”

Harland calculated that she ended up giving up about $1,000 worth of pay because she was not able to start her summer job earlier. When asked how that number made her feel, she responded: “Very upset–that’s a lot of money….I get nothing out of being an orientation leader other than emotional things. I get no physical needs met other than the meals for while we’re on the trip. I’d be spending my time in a paid position if I was not doing this.”

The lack of pay, however, does not affect Harland’s willingness to do this job, “At the end of my trip, I was like, I don’t want to do that again next year,” Harland said, “But then, interacting with my kids on campus after the trip has made it worth it. I want to do it again.”

While workers in unpaid positions grapple with the ethics of that issue, many still feel that the positions are worth it for the experience they are gaining.

“I applied sort of thinking I was getting paid,” said Brown. “But when it turned out I wasn’t getting paid, I still wanted to do it.” However, he saw how the lack of pay could affect other leaders’ ability to perform. “Fortunately, I’ve been able to make it work without being paid, but I know there are other awesome leaders [who had to quit] because they need to use that time during the summer to make money.”

Hernandez describes the confusion that his orientation student participants typically experience when they learn that OLs are unpaid. “When I tell [my students] I don’t [get paid], they’re very shocked and surprised and they’re very confused.” Hernandez described his students saying they think he should be paid for his work: “You kind of feel like you have to justify why you’re doing all this work, and why you’re doing it all for free.” Singer shared a similar experience in her role. “[Freshman involved in EMT recruiting have said] ‘Wait, you guys don’t get paid?’ and then just say ‘Well, that’s not doable for me.’”

As vital positions to the well-being of campus, OLs acknowledge how they can affect their participants’ college experiences. “The reality of it is that orientation leaders put in so much work and truly care about the college,” said Hernandez. Natilie Mikhaeel ’26, an OA Leader, said that her role to her participants is as “their first mentors on campus. Letting them know about college if they have any questions and then keeping that relationship going throughout the semester.” Brown agreed. “You go out, lead your trip, come back and are generally supposed to be a resource for your participants for the foreseeable future, however long that may be.”

Similarly, EMTs don’t do the work they do for the money: “I love being there for people when they are sick, when they do not feel good, when they’ve had an injury. I like being a person who can provide both emotional support and medical support as well. As cliche as it sounds, I really like helping people,” Singer said.

Despite the emotional, physical and financial commitment, every former OL interviewed by

The Spectator

said they planned to continue in their role. “[My motivator] was just being the first person that a first year needs and getting to sort of shape their experience at the beginning of college, because it’s such a scary time for them,” said Hernandez. “For me, I know what that feels like and…all I ever wanted to do was just create a really great environment as much as I could. Nothing ever discouraged me.”

Black has found the social connections of being an EMT to be a benefit that makes the position more than a job. “I really love the people that I get to work with as an EMT. I think that the other EMTs on campus are really fantastic people [and] work really well together.” Black further notes that the position is a “really great way to help [her] community” because “having people on campus who have medical training…to support [others] in crisis or emergencies is really valuable.”

Though these students work in these positions because they care deeply about the role that they are fulfilling, many of them would like to see this appreciation from the administration, especially in terms of pay. “We need the senior admin to approve more funding for the orientation budget because it’s super important,” said Hernandez. “Why wouldn’t you do that?”

“I’m willing to work with the administration,” said Singer. “I don’t see them as an enemy of any sort, but I think it’s important that they hear from us as students who work with the school, as students who work some crazy hours for the school. I think it’s really important that they hear from us and our perspectives, and also about our lives in general.”

However, it can also be frustrating for students to feel underappreciated in the work that they’re doing for the college: “From my perspective, I’ve never heard President Wippman or anyone, ever, be appreciative of the orientation leaders,” said Hernandez. “Never heard a thank you. I’ve just always seen him wear a shirt on the day of [move in] that says orientation programs on it so it looks like he cares.”