Head of Student Life (Live-in RA)

Young Founders School; New York (NY); On-site; USD 120,000 - 170,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Housing provided

Relocation assistance

Health benefits

Meal plan

Job summary

Founders School in New York City seeks a Head of Student Life who will live on-site and lead after-school and weekend activities, becoming the primary adult presence for boarding students. You’ll design calendars, shape house culture, and maintain open communication with families.

The role centers on evenings and weekends, with housing provided and relocation support. This is not a traditional 9–5 campus job, and you’ll operate in a dynamic, high-standard youth environment.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated experience building teen programs and culture.
• Ability to manage evenings and weekend activities for 14–18 year olds.
• Willingness to live on-site in NYC with relocation support.
• Authorized to work in the US and CPR/first-aid certification.

Responsibilities

• Live on-site in residences and be the primary adult presence evenings and weekends.
• Design and run after-school and weekend calendar for activities.
• Build house culture with norms and routines and safety focus.
• Coordinate shuttle rhythms and boarding parent communication.
• Scale RA coverage as boarding grows and ensure continuity.

Skills

Teen community building

Group activities for teens

Clear communication with parents

Live-on-site readiness

CPR/First-aid certification

Job description

Founders School is a four-year high school for ambitious teenagers who build real companies. Days are for academics and entrepreneurship. Evenings and weekends are where community, character, and belonging get built - or don't.

We're hiring the founding Head of Student Life: the adult who lives with our out of town students, owns after-school and weekend life, and turns NYC into a place teenagers are proud to call home.

This is not a 9-5 campus job. School hours (~8:45am-5pm) are largely yours, you get one night off each week, and you get a lot of real breaks when students aren't here - summers, holidays, and school breaks. Your real shift is evenings, weekends (minus that night off), and the culture in between. If you want a desk job that ends at 5, don't apply. If you're the person kids orbit at camp - the counselor everyone remembers - keep reading.

The Role

You live with our out of town students and own student life outside the school day: after-school activities, weekends, evenings, community norms, and the everyday human stuff that makes a house feel safe and alive.

During school hours you're free — gym, errands, planning, rest, your own work — because the night and weekend are when the students need you most. You also get one night off each week (secondary coverage holds the house), and when school is out for summers, holidays, and other breaks, you're largely off too - this isn't year-round 24/7 with no relief. You're the house parent, the activity director, and the community builder in one seat.

You're not their academic coach and you're not their startup advisor. You're the reason they have something better to do than sit on a laptop until lights out.

What you will be doing

• Living on-site in our residences and being the primary adult presence evenings and weekends.
• Designing and running a packed after-school and weekend calendar - sports, games, neighborhood exploration, cooking nights, community events, trips - with a bias toward getting kids off screens and into real rooms with each other.
• Building culture: house norms, chores, lights-out (~10pm), guest rules, and the tone that says high standards and high care at the same time.
• Knowing every boarding student well enough to spot when someone's off - mood, health, conflict, loneliness - and escalating fast through the coverage ladder while families hear from you immediately on anything concerning.
• Coordinating shuttle rhythms, evening logistics, weekend plans, and the boarding parent chat so families always know what's going on.
• Shaping additional RA coverage as boarding grows, so home life isn't a single point of failure.

What you will NOT be doing

• Working a traditional school-day schedule. Campus owns ~8:45am-5pm. Your job is the other hours.
• Teaching academics or running Founders entrepreneurship coaching. Guides, FounderOS, EIRs, and mentors own that.
• Being a passive night watch. Presence without programming is failure in year one - we over-schedule options on purpose.
• Treating teenagers like fragile kids who can't handle real standards. We coach them the way elite youth programs do: expect a lot, push hard, back them harder.
• Disappearing on weekends. Weekends are peak student-life time, not your off-switch.

What this becomes

At 6 months: Boarding has a real evening and weekend rhythm. Students know the calendar, the house norms stick without constant policing, families trust you as the human face of home life, and secondary coverage exists so one sick day doesn't break the system.

At 12 months: Student life is a product, not a scramble - repeatable weekly programming, strong community among boarding + day students where it helps, RA playbooks others can run, and you're the obvious owner of residential life as we open more units and eventually more cities.

As Founders School scales, this seat becomes the template for Head of Student Life on every campus. The path belongs to whoever proves they can build a teen community people talk about.

Candidate requirements

• You are an exceptional teen community builder. Camp counselor, dorm RA, youth program lead, coach, gap-year leader - title matters less than proof that teenagers trust you and want to be where you are.
• You have run group activities and culture for teens or young adults before, not just supervised a space.
• You can hold a room of 14-18 year olds at 8pm on a Tuesday and have them glad they showed up.
• You are energized by evenings and weekends with kids, and you're genuinely fine living on-site in NYC with them.
• You communicate clearly with parents - calm, direct, over-communicate on anything that matters.
• You can live on-site (housing provided rent-free, plus relocation support available), receive standard health benefits and food, and are authorized to work in the US.
• Background check and CPR / first-aid certification required (or willingness to complete before start).

Nice to have

• Multi-year camp, boarding school, or residential youth program experience
• Athletics / outdoor / adventure programming chops
• Experience building activity calendars from zero
• Comfort in NYC (transit, neighborhoods, keeping a group safe in the city)
• Prior live-in RA or house-parent experience

Do not apply if

• You need quiet nights and free weekends to function. This role is the opposite.
• Teenagers drain you. Students can tell within a week.
• You want to be in the building primarily during school hours. That's not this job.
• You're looking for a stepping-stone campus admin title without actually living the dorm life.
• You're uncomfortable with high standards for teenagers, or with $150K/year tuition for a program that guarantees real outcomes.

The most ambitious teenagers in the country need somewhere great to be after 5pm. You can be the person who builds that.