Anonymous wrote:It was a horrible accident. Yes, there had been drinking, but not hazing. He didn’t know how to swim but fell in the water and no one saw. My child knows him and says he was a wonderful ,bright, kind person. His friends are devastated.

Drinking makes you more likely to fall.
And probably t likely that the others kids would notice or respond.

A tragic accident all around, but alcohol use around water is dangerous. If it was on campus, then enforcement could have been lacking.

Anonymous wrote:

Dartmouth seems to have a lot of student deaths from substance abuse & suicide.

Neighbor's child is now a junior or senior at Dartmouth. Complained during the first two years that the student deaths were too much to bear at times. Some occurred on campus, some occurred off campus.

Not really. Dartmouth usually has had one student suicide every year or two. That spiked during the pandemic - there were three Class of 2024 freshman suicides during the first year of the pandemic (one of which was at home) -- related not to fraternities but isolation -- and a few in the subsequent years. The campus was outraged, the administration relaxed its COVID policies, and increased mental health resources. It made an impression on students there at the time, as well it should have. Might have drawn more attention than it would have in a larger or more urban school.

Absent more data -- and again, prior to the pandemic the suicide rate among Dartmouth students was low -- not sure the (unique) pandemic experience/policies, or anecdotal reports about one school, say anything particularly meaningful about how one college's suicide rate compares to other's (eg Princeton also had an uptick in suicides in 2022). But don't let that stop you.

Yes really.

The Dartmouth students received news of deaths of students at home during break (several believed to be suicides). These are not included in campus statistics.

He was class of ‘26, which is the first class for whom the swimming test/class requirement was dropped (aside from pandemic year). I absolutely understand why they dropped it - but it cuts both ways in terms of impact. That said, a student died in the river when I was a student, too. He could swim but had been drinking. All incredibly sad. The water also gets quite cold during much of regular school year and that too can be fatal.

My high school teammate - a track runner and an Ivy League champion - found Dartmouth to be heavily social (he was in a frat) but had little trouble refraining from drinking. Like many at Dartmouth he was an expert skier and that also motivated him to take care of his body. Perhaps he was helped by the fact that his coach became the most prominent coach in the NCAA (at UVA today) and just wouldn’t have put up with much drinking or partying. He went on to a graduate degree at Chicago and truly made Dartmouth work for him. I went to a school with a similar social profile (Duke) but was poor and so grateful to go to school on scholarship I couldn’t have cared less about the Greek system or drinking, both of which I avoided. I do think the Greek system and drinking are major distractions for some and it may be better for some kids to avoid these kinds of schools. As far as friends, I had a few friends on the women’s basketball team - back before people went to games - and they were truly great friends - no matter the nature of their personal lives. One woman is President of a LAC today and I couldn’t have found a better gem of a friend anywhere. School is what you make it.