WaPo: Suicidal students are pressured to withdraw from Yale

[Anonymous]

https://wapo.st/3O1cOnB

I gifted this article so those without a subscription can read it. I found this article to be sobering and was honestly shocked that Yale treats students with mental health issues as pariahs.

[Anonymous]

I haven’t read the article, but when I was suicidal in law school I wish I’d been encouraged to withdraw on a leave of absence. An elite school is a pressure cooker and the suicidal mind doesn’t need that, it needs self care and full nights of sleep and healing. My elite law school was only too happy to keep taking my tuition fees and didn’t care at all that I was barely surviving much less getting the benefit of the education I was taking on a mortgage to obtain.

Students with acute mental health issues at any university should be encouraged to leave if that is what treating physicians recommend and assured that their place would be waiting when they were ready to return. That’s respecting the healing required from suicidal ideation and putting the student’s well being ahead of the cash grab.

[Anonymous]

Read the article. The students are not being assured that their place will be waiting for them! It’s a horribly sad article and callous treatment of students by Yale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://wapo.st/3O1cOnB

I gifted this article so those without a subscription can read it. I found this article to be sobering and was honestly shocked that Yale treats students with mental health issues as pariahs.

I read this article today. I feel terrible for the students in that article. Our mental healthy system is broken in this country. Yale doesn’t want the liability, I guess, but do they consider how much they are contributing the problem? A security guard walking you back to your dorm and telling you to pack up your stuff and leave within 2 hours? Having Yale admin FaceTime you while you’re in a mental health crisis at the hospital and tell you you’re being kicked out? Wow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I haven’t read the article, but when I was suicidal in law school I wish I’d been encouraged to withdraw on a leave of absence. An elite school is a pressure cooker and the suicidal mind doesn’t need that, it needs self care and full nights of sleep and healing. My elite law school was only too happy to keep taking my tuition fees and didn’t care at all that I was barely surviving much less getting the benefit of the education I was taking on a mortgage to obtain.

Students with acute mental health issues at any university should be encouraged to leave if that is what treating physicians recommend and assured that their place would be waiting when they were ready to return. That’s respecting the healing required from suicidal ideation and putting the student’s well being ahead of the cash grab.

Thanks for sharing this. (Not OP.) How did things turn out? Did you stay in school? I hope you feel better now.

[Anonymous]

That was a tough read.

[Anonymous]

This was an issue when I was a student ~2010. Ut was an open secret that if you took mental health leave they wouldn’t let you back in.

[Anonymous]

Schools are not equip to deal with mental health challenges.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Schools are not equip to deal with mental health challenges.

Read the article, Yale is way beyond this. They were cruel.

[Anonymous]

I genuinely do not know why any parent would let their kid go to that school. It has been exceptionally toxic for years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools are not equip to deal with mental health challenges.

Read the article, Yale is way beyond this. They were cruel.

Not really. Schools cannot handle that kind of mental health issues and in a semester or two, its not going to get that much better nor is the right environment. Those students need to be hospitalized and intensive treatment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools are not equip to deal with mental health challenges.

Read the article, Yale is way beyond this. They were cruel.

Agree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools are not equip to deal with mental health challenges.

Read the article, Yale is way beyond this. They were cruel.

Not really. Schools cannot handle that kind of mental health issues and in a semester or two, its not going to get that much better nor is the right environment. Those students need to be hospitalized and intensive treatment.

NP: Read the article. Many students are relying on the healthcare and supports provided including their friends nearby. Yale certainly has enough money to figure out something in between kicking out students and having students crash & burn on campus indefinitely. There has to be some middle ground.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Schools are not equip to deal with mental health challenges.

Read the article, Yale is way beyond this. They were cruel.

Yes. Cruelty is part of Yale. It is systemic there.

[Anonymous]

IMHO, Yale is right to require students take a leave of absence after a suicide attempt, but wrong to put up any barriers to return the following semester or the one after that (depending on when the attempt took place). They should expunge any grades from the lost semester.

A suicide attempt--but not necessarily suicidal thoughts--show that a student needs serious mental health attention that can't be fully addressed while also trying to attend to the classes that in many cases are at minimum exacerbating the situation.