<p>truth. Long time no see, norcal, hope you are well.</p>
<p>The fact is, probability says suicides will happen at Cornell and at any other school. And they do. What is raising attention these days is the “cluster suicide” situation, and the spectacular method of choice at Cornell. As cruel as it sounds, with 20,000 students from all 50 states, 200-something countries, and a ridiculous amount of ethnic, financial, and whatever else diversity, expecting zero suicides or deep depression is, frankly, foolish.</p>
<p>I agree. But how do we dispel this myth when every year 3,000 first-year students set foot on campus with expectations that Cornell will be a grind?</p>
<p>Thanks. I’m taking the USMLE in June so it’s been a crazy semester trying to keep up with med school and studying for boards at the same time. Right now, we’re in the middle of the neuro unit. For some reason, the school decided to cram all of the nervous system into 2 weeks so we have 34 lectures in these two weeks. And that’s all before noon. Then we have more class in the afternoon. Not fun.</p>
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<p>Oh, I’m sure the creative minds at Cornell can come up with something. Send all prospective students a list of courses available at Cornell and casually slip in the median grades. Or if you think that’s too tacky, then just include a note about Cornell’s average GPA in the fact box section. Include some quotes (from people like me) about how Cornell is challenging but not unfair. Talk to WashU people about the power of aggressive marketing.</p>
<p>There’s no reason for students to come to Cornell with a sense of dread and feeling like they’re going to be beaten down. It’s not that type of school.</p>
<p>One thing that occured to me is they should show a video during orientation titled something like “what if this doesn’t work out?”. They could put one of my friends in it, he scraped through in and out of probation several times during his stay there. He is now a VP of some tech company and doing very well, having accumulated two master’s degrees along the way. and my freshman rommmate, who flunked out of ILR and wound up graduating from his local state u. When I saw him years ago he was gainfully employed, with a family, and doing just fine. Kurt Vonnegut managed to do ok in the end too, despite joining the army to avoid flunking out as a chem major.</p>
<p>Just so people see that doing poorly here need not be the end of the world.</p>
<p>On the other hand if they did that maybe everyone would start bailing out as soon as they get their first “C” on a Chem 207 prelim.</p>
<p>woody- I am not a Cornell student…i’m a high school Senior.</p>
<p>Norcalguy - I’m not going to argue that the academic systems of top teir schools are diffrent but i will say that there would be no possible basis for comparison in terms of what you’ve gone through. You went to Cornell, and probably only have been through that system. How sure are you that Harvard or Brown don’t put more leniency when grading? For all you know, you could’ve probably breezed through Yale SEAS.</p>
<p>By labeling it “suicide cluster” I think most people are trying to give a justifiable reason as to why Cornell is known as the suicide school. The rencent ‘suicide cluster’ IS what contributes to Cornell being known as a suicide school! It’s not something that one should add…“exception” to.</p>
<p>There are objective ways to comparing grading b/w peer schools. Luckily Cornell makes this info easily available (average GPA, median grades, etc.). All of this info is available on the internet. There is no evidence Cornell is harder than any peer schools. Average GPA of 3.4 is in line with other top schools. </p>
<p>You are making a judgement about a school that you have no clue about. You don’t know what the grading is like here. You don’t know what the support system is like. You are making inferences based on a couple of news stories you read over the internet. </p>
<p>Cornell was known as a suicide school BEFORE the suicide cluster. It had no basis. Cornell’s suicide rate was at the national average.</p>
<p>Gomestar & Norcal - Good to hear from both of you!</p>
<p>Unfortunately Cornell is continually the “victim” of 2 misconceptions that keep perpetuating themselves, decade after decade: the suicide rate; “easiest ivy to get into…” If Cornell has a PR firm, they should be fired!</p>
<p>Cornell is rigorous, but isn’t college all about getting an education? And isn’t the point of going to Cornell to get a GOOD education? As the mother of an engineering senior, I know that it’s also manageable while having a social life, hockey tickets, & participating in greek life. </p>
<p>Serious depression runs far deeper than being upset about a grade. Often depression/mental health issues are because of a chemical imbalance. It’s important to understand that rather than just saying it’s because of Cornell’s grading, or something unique to Cornell. </p>
<p>That being said, it’s important to recognize those who might need your assistance & reach out to them as best your can.</p>
<p>I dunno about “decade after decade”, when I was there Penn was the easiest Ivy to get into, and I think that was the case for a good long while, until the early 90s IIRC.</p>
<p>I hate to say this, but they may have to put barriers up on all the bridges.
Hopefully they can find something less visually obtrusive than what’s on the suspension bridge, maybe something in a transparent fiberglass? But, warranted or not, from a publicity perspective at least it seems to me they have to be perceived as taking some definitive, material action. Hopefully they will find some actions to take that will actually help. But they have to take action anyway, regardless.</p>
<p>I know nobody in the community wants that to happen, but what are you going to do, they simply can’t have any more jumpers off the bridges anymore. People may off themselves the old fashioned way, but this way is now too much of a PR liability, seems to me. Every time it happens it will be splashed all over the place, regardless of whether the rate is greater or lesser than national averages.</p>
<p>maybe I’m missing something, but isn’t it far easier to just jump off the side of the gorge than to scale the suspension bridge in the first place? PR issue as it is, Cornell students are still adults (Cad’s children a notable exception), and I wonder what type of thoughts will be provoked each day for 4,000 freshmen as they walk by the bridge’s new “jump deterring system”.</p>
<p>The Golden Gate bridge doesn’t have anything either despite the far more frequent jumps.</p>
<p>If it were “better”, net net, for them to use the sides of the gorges, that’s what they would be doing. But they are going off the bridges. Or am I mistaken about that?</p>
<p>The ones I recall the people all went off the bridges.
Actually one of them did it accidentally, brilliant drunk boy thought it was a great idea to do handstands on the bridge arm rail, on the way home from the chapter house.</p>
<p>I think that same year the girl went off the suspension bridge, ultimately resulting in the bars. My chronology may be all wrong though.</p>
<p>I think it’s a wee bit of both the bridges and suspension bridge. I am unsure as to how the final decision was settled, the suspension bridge is much less of a public spectacle, but it’s tougher to climb over the fencing they have. In any case it takes a pretty determined soul to climb either and get the job done. I can’t imagine walking 10 feet to the side of the bridge to the cliff would be asking too much for those so determined.</p>
<p>edit: just looked it up, looks like 3 different students used 3 different bridges.</p>
<p>Is that a basis for comparison?..You know that makes no sense…right? How can you make assumptions based upon the GPA/Grades of two different schools? Are the professors the same?..do they assign the same coursework? So because theyre top tier schools, you can make that assumption. Im sorry to say that youre dearly wrong.
How do you think top tier schools are chosen?</p>
<p>And hahaha pls, dont say I have no clue of what Cornell is like. I know too much about Cornell to even start naming. (Lets not head to uncharted territories).</p>
<p>I dont read a few stories off the internet and then start blurting stuff out here and there. I know Cornell was a suicide school WAY BEFORE the suicide cluster. I said that its a CONTRIBUTING factor and it should not be EXCLUDED because in a statement prior, there was something about with the exception of the suicide cluster, like it should be shoved to the side.</p>
<p>Thank you for your honesty and rational thinking. You really cannot discount any causes, especially the high pressured academics. In my son’s math class, they were told the next math prelim would be prepared to be much harder than the previous one, because the mean grade on the first prelim was higher than expected. I guess that is punishment for understanding the material??? Is this pressure necessary. The class struggled quite a bit to understand the material of the first exam.</p>
<p>Honestly, I think we should let these threads die and give this topic a rest.
As a student, I don’t want to constantly hear/see about this topic any longer.
What happened is done and over with, Cornell is doing an amazing job at handling the issue and discussing it won’t really change anything. We all know these sorts of things are bound to happen no matter what the circumstance. So can we just let this go and focus on helping other kids here? Thanks :)</p>
<p>Sorry, CayugaRed, my husband and I both grew up in that area, and while the name “suicide school” may be offensive, the suicides were stunningly common. Tragic, but not terribly rare. Well known enough that they’ve been debated for years and years.</p>
<p>RiceBoy:
I understand the stress the kids are experiencing, but you said that “these sorts of
things are bound to happen no matter what the circumstance.” They should not be happening at all and especially not at this rate. If this is an ongoing problem, then it needs to be investigated thoroughly, no stone unturned, to try to stop this pattern.</p>
<p>Sorry Mom22039, but the statistics on actual suicides compared to other campuses show that the suicides, while possibly stunning, and not terribly rare, were not stunningly common in comparison to other campuses. The suicide rate there was about average. that’s what the data showed, IIRC. Links to articles citing this data have been posted in various of the threads that have popped up here over the last few days, if you do a search you will find them.</p>
<p>cadmiumred: the situation you are describing is a dynamic that can occur in any explicitly curved course. I’ve a friend in a pre-nursing program at a local community college, as he’s described it his anatomy classes have the identical dynamic. Except he said they curve to a C. </p>
<p>These curved intro classes stink I hated them, I’ve had the experience of walking out of prelims where the average was 37. There is pressure there, no doubt about it. But at the end of the day, most people who do poorly on a test do not jump off a bridge over it. The data does not support any inordinate problem there, relative to other schools. Though this spat this year is clearly an exception.</p>
<p>Clearly they will investigate, and I expect they will make some changes. But some of you people here, who perhaps are looking at this for the first time, are looking at the recent rate of deaths as if that is the normal state of affairs there, when in fact it is an aberration.</p>
<p>Like I said, Cornell its doing its best job, multiple professors had spent a good deal of time during lectures reaching out to the students, Cornell has extended days and hours for counseling, and people are patrolling the bridges now. I’m not sure what else you expect bc closing the school, putting nets beneath the bridges, or canceling exams would be ridiculous.</p>