When Colleges Go On Suicide Watch

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Many schools are trying to emulate the University of Illinois, which requires students who express suicidal thoughts to see a counselor for four sessions if they want to remain in school. More than 1,800 students have gone through the program since it was launched in the early '80s, and none have committed suicide. Only one participant was forced to leave.

While Illinois rarely advocates taking time off from school, Cornell pushes a hundred or so of its students each year to take a voluntary medical leave that allows them not only to get help but also to de-stress. In Giedinghagen's case, it didn't take long for her to realize her fake-it-till-you-make-it strategy wasn't working. By April, she says, "the stress was so bad that I knew if I stayed at Cornell one more week, I would kill myself." After lengthy discussions with her therapists, the double major in German and neurobiology agreed to head home last month to Kansas City, Mo., with plans to enter a psychiatric hospital. Five weeks later, she's disappointed that Cornell hasn't made any follow-up calls to see how she's doing. But Cornell's deputy counsel Roth has an explanation: "Once the student is gone or goes home, the individual becomes the responsibility of parents. Our obligation ends."