Difficult Secondary Question: Disagree with Authority

[medstudent257]

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Hello,

So I came across a secondary question that I'm stumped on. I'm not sure what they are looking for by asking this question. The prompt states:

Describe a challenging situation in which you did not agree with a directive/rule and how you handled this.


I have a few ideas for this, but I don't think they hit the mark at all.

Idea I:

I was an RA last year where we had to deal with some difficult situations. When approaching incidents, the rule is to always have another RA with you. One night on rounds with another RA, I came across a few residents in the building who were concerned about their friend who was supposedly in some type of distress (was later determined to be intoxicated) and was in the bathroom. The RA I was partnered with at the time was the opposite sex, so she wasn't allowed to the enter the bathroom. Since she couldn't enter the bathroom, I would technically be alone when approaching the situation (which was not allowed). According to policy, what we were supposed to do is wait for another RA/professional staff member to arrive, which would take 10-20 mins. I didn't consider this an ideal option, because the resident's condition could potentially worsen while we waited. What I did to squeeze through the situation was having her stay at the foot of the bathroom while I go into the situation to investigate, and convinced him to leave the stall and wait with us outside the hallway.

Idea II:

I volunteered at a muscular dystrophy camp. The initial directive at the camp was to let the kids do what they want, and to give them the best time possible. However, a day in the camp, they stated that they wanted us to push the kids into doing activities, such as swim, even if they didn't want to initially, as many of the kids wouldn't have this opportunity at home. My camper in particular expressed discomfort/irritation when being asked to swim because he didn't want to be lowered in the water (was in a powerchair). Upon telling the people running the camp, they said to still keep insisting on how fun swimming was multiple times a day. Knowing that he would only become more irritated with me, I decided not to keep badgering him on swimming, and only asked him if he was interested in swimming once-a day. I ultimately did this to ensure that we would be on good terms throughout the rest of the camp.

 

[DokterMom]

#I is not terribly exciting, but you handled it well -- You determined and respected the underlying intent of the rule, finessed the minor rule 'bend', then solved the problem.

#2 is much trickier and I think offered more creative problem-solving strategies than the one you mentioned. (I'd have tried to get the camper to sit on the edge of the pool and dangle his feet -- that's all -- until s/he expressed a willingness for more.)

#1 is a pretty safe bet --

 

[medstudent257]

#I is not terribly exciting, but you handled it well -- You determined and respected the underlying intent of the rule, finessed the minor rule 'bend', then solved the problem.

#2 is much trickier and I think offered more creative problem-solving strategies than the one you mentioned. (I'd have tried to get the camper to sit on the edge of the pool and dangle his feet -- that's all -- until s/he expressed a willingness for more.)

#1 is a pretty safe bet --

I should note that in two, I did manage to get the guy to sit in his powerchair by the pool. The problem with the feet thing is that it would require getting him out of the chair and using Hoyer lift to place him on the ground, which would be somewhat invasive. Plus, for safety reasons, you weren't allowed to do the feet thing with the campers in the first place. It was either in the water, or on the deck. Nevertheless, I do agree that one is the better option, because I already talked about the camp in one of the other prompts.

 

[Isoval]

I agree that one is the better option; I think it’s more substantive with a greater role played by you.