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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Ivy League Students Commits Suicide Again

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Yet another student at a prestigious university has taken his own life.

In the month of January alone, three students at Ivy League institution Columbia University has committed suicide. Between last September and January, Ivy League schools have lost a total of seven students, who decided to end their own lives.

Last October, 18-year-old Taylor Gilpin Wallace told his mother that he “wants to jump out of the window” as the pain stemming from having such thoughts is not something “anyone else can imagine” during a phone call. A few days later, he was found dead at his home in Missouri.

Jacquelyn Basulto, 21, who recently finished received her bachelor’s degree in political science, told The New York Post: “Four hours a night sleep was normal for me. I think Columbia has a really hostile, competitive culture.”

“I told them I was feeling suicidal,” Basulto said of the time she visited the school’s counseling service center.

Korean-American students are no exception to the disturbing trend. Rae Na Lee, a former student at Yale, and Princeton University student Wonshik Shin both took their own lives last November and December, respectively.

Last March, Victor Chang also committed suicide while attending Brown University. In April 2015, Brown University graduate student Hyoun-ju Sohn killed himself.

Many students agreed during last year’s Korean-American college students’ conference in Manhattan that a large number of their peers either have or contemplated committing suicide. Carnegie Mellon’s Eugene Chung said two students took their own lives in the previous year, before adding that schools often try to sweep such a disturbing story under the rug to avoid backlash.

When asked why they believe their peers resort to suicide, the students agreed that “depression often blinds them from seeing hope.”

Recently released statistics reveal that approximately 1,000 college students commit suicide very year. Suicide Prevention Resource Center suggested that at least 7 percent of the college students in the United States consider taking their own lives at some point during their academic careers.

Additionally, suicide is the second leading cause of death within the age group between 25 and 34. For ages between 15 and 24, suicide is the third leading cause of death. In a 2014 study, 9.5 percent of the 150,000 college freshmen at four-year schools admitted that they are depressed frequently.

By Han Seo Seo