If the student is 18 – parents have no right to their medical records or legally to make them seek treatment or anything else. Parents may still have some economic power and maybe some ability to persuade, but no legal ability to get their kid to do anything.
@MaineLonghorn He needs to run it up the ranks, not hold this concern to himself. DH had to do that. The right dept folks take it to the right dean who can bring in U resources.
Most U’s operate without In Loco Parentis. If parents can’t attend to their child’s needs or aren’t attuned, it;s not the responsibility of the college to take on a parental role.
My kid was over 18 when she crashed and the hospital called us, (after getting her permission.) She was not in mortal danger. The details aren’t needed here but many know she’s worked through those issues. Nonetheless, the college did make it clear that the precipitating events/behaviors would not be tolerated, for her own safety. One turning point. Not all kids are as lucky.
Starting to get to misinformation on here. Even for a mandatory reporter, you are talking about knowledge of a person who has voiced thoughts of suicide, not observing warning signs. I expect most college employees would report regardless at that point although friends might keep it a secret thinking that was the way to earn trust.
Suicide is also not always tied to mental illness. Often a person is depressed but not always. Sometimes a single event does set a person on a path to suicide. Other times, the person may have struggled with thoughts of suicide for years.
Professors and TAs would benefit from training on suicide alertness but the people most likely to pick up on signs are other students. A prof or TA just isn’t around any given student enough to pick up on subtle warning signs. The real efforts at suicide alertness training need to be targeting to peers. And no, that would not make fellow students liable for failing to recognize warning signs.
As a professor in a big, private university, I can say that at least in this university (and I assume in all others) faculty are given manuals that detail procedures for helping students in crisis. Over the past twenty years of teaching, not a single year has passed without one or more of my graduate and/or undergraduate students having a mental crisis. I always call the student health center and speak directly to the director of mental health services. These students are always relieved to have their psychological problems recognized and addressed by competent professionals. Roommates often don’t know how to, or can’t, handle this responsibility. RA’s are only trained to kick the problem up the ladder to an administrator. But schools can only do so much for such students. Most colleges are not healthy places for students who are emotionally and psychologically fragile. Even in the schools that do offer excellent support and therapy for such students, the first line of defense for these young adults are their parents. Problems - social, physical, psychological - inevitably arise for students living away from home for the first time. Parents need to convince their kids that their safety and emotional stability matter more than their grades, their admission to, or inability to remain in, a particular college. With the support of family, trained therapists and psychiatrists, such students can have the opportunity to lead full, healthy lives at a college where they don’t feel inadequate and overwhelmed.
@lookingforward and @worriestoomuch thanks for your responses. I will tell the professor what you wrote.
Wow, this really struck me. 
Some students develop mental health issues while at school. It is the age for new onset of illness, and the combination of transition, and academic and social stress, can also trigger. In cases like that, neither parents nor school may be aware until the problem develops to the point it is noticeable, and that doesn’t always happen.
There are students who may suddenly and unexpectedly self-harm without diagnosed preexisting mental health issues, after bad grades or a breakup, that kind of thing.
For those students already diagnosed during high school, I disagree with TomSr about the need to go to school close to home. If a depression or other mental health issue such as bipolar disorder is treated and stabilized, then it becomes just like other health issues, and I strongly believe in access to all schools for all capable students.
That said, a young person can certainly choose to remain close to home and to familiar doctors, and some may go away only to return. There should be no pressure to return to previous levels of achievement or rigor if the student doesn’t want that.
But I think young people with mental health issues have a right to go to any school in any location if they have faced their illness squarely, take their meds, and access adequate support.
^Yes, it really depends on the individual student. My son couldn’t handle being away from home, but my daughter and other son are all thriving, far from home. All three kids have diagnoses.
And if you had asked me ten years about to predict the future, I would have seen none of this. So mental illness really can strike out of nowhere.
But for some young people being away from their home routine and parental control results in their not taking their meds and accessing support services. This would require parents to undertake costly travel to help or retrieve their student. For affluent parents with the ability to travel that may not be an issue, for most parents it would be.
It is not the responsibility of a college to monitor the student to ensure that they are doing what is required to maintain their mental equilibrium.
But not if we expect schools to monitor the students and ensure their safety. The schools would then take a very conservative view and guideline in how they admit students in order to avoid liabilities.
No I don’t think it is the responsibility of colleges and universities. I do they think they have a moral obligation to tell the student to take a leave of absence if they suspect the student is reported to be and is confirmed to be at risk to the health or mental well being of the rest of the campus. I think any business would proceed in this manner if they had an at risk employee. It would be nice if a uni refunded the tuition if a student had to leave mid semester but no I don’t think there is any legal responsibility for monitoring and the assumption is that students arrive of sound mind and appropriately medically controlled if needed by that student.
^My son’s school and co-op housing refunded everything when he dropped out mid-semester. We were very thankful! For a big school, UT-Austin acted with a lot of compassion.
Yes, I do think that is the right thing to do in a leave of absence situation.
No, not unless there is some gross negligence. Example a professor sitting there sees the student is about to do something obvious, like take a ton of pills, and does nothing.
I have a daughter that is 20, mental illness, won’t take her meds, won’t go to her doctors, won’t do what the hospital said to do, won’t get a job, won’t go to school and threatens suicide. We have had her hospitalized but she won’t follow through. She is an adult. I do all I can but I don’t think I would be liable if she commits suicide, I don’t think anyone else should be either. You can’t be there 24 hours a day or force an adult to do what they should. Hospitals won’t even keep them very long if they know to say the right things to get out.
I think people should read my post carefully. I said once they have faced their illness squarely, take their meds, and access adequate support. Any other position is discriminatory. I also said that, (of course) a kid can choose to stay near home too.
And once 18, parents cannot make sure their kids take their meds either, so even being in the next room doesn’t help. It is much more useful to let kids live their lives and learn so that they have the internal desire to take meds. Side not that does not have to do with college attendance but with compliance.
sorry my mother has dementia and called me for the 12th time while I was finishing!! I meant “side note.”
We are discussing many different scenarios here, the kid who was diagnosed during high school, the kid who goes to college fine but develops problems, the kid who goes on leave, or who leaves school, etc. etc. I am referring specifically to a kid who is diagnosed before college, maybe takes an extra year before school to get healthy and is fully compliant (which can certainly take more than a year for some). I think that in that situation a young person can choose where to go, as long as it is affordable, just like anyone else.
I had to reread the story. I interpreted it as the family knew and alerted the school that the student was a suicide risk. Upon rereading, I am not sure if that is the case or if the parents are charging that the school “should have known” for some reason.
I’m really not sure how the school “should have known.” Professors see their students for 3-4 hours at most a week. Unless it’s a small seminar class, it’s likely the professors barely know the students.
I am all for students going off to college who have illnesses- whatever illness- under control. This includes physical and mental. I don’t think the rest of your life should be limited just because you have a mental health condition.
With that said, this is one of the few times that I think it’s appropriate for a parent to withhold funds for education. If you don’t think your child is mentally or physically able to go to sleep away college, do not let them go until if/when they are. Very few students can go to sleep-away without their parents’ cooperation or high merit awards. My worst breakdown was in my junior year of high school but I would hope that my parents would’ve made me stay home for a year if I had had it senior year. It took over a year to get back on track and I don’t think I could’ve done it if I didn’t have parents’ help.
I am very open with my students that they can come to me if they’re feeling overwhelmed or having trouble for whatever reason. A few have, most have not. I suspect a few are struggling and I have reached out to touch base with them, but I also know as someone who has struggled with depression for a long time that when you’re in a dark place, the hardest thing can be reaching out or accepting help.
Outside of reaching out, what do people expect the college to do? Send a well-check? I can think of about a 1,000 different ways that that can backfire. Alert their parents? That is probably some sort of HIPAA violation.
Most of my students are missing section or mentally checking out because they just don’t want to come and/or are sleep deprived. Are we supposed to follow every one and make sure that they’re emotionally and mentally healthy?
And for grad students- studies show that at least half of us have at least one mental illness. What the heck is a college supposed to do with that?
The school should not be held liable, unless there was negligence on the part of one of its employees. Holding the student accountable for what he wrote in an email is not negligence. Negligence would be in he visited their health services, or their counseling department and made it known that he was suicidal, and they did not act to get him the help needed. Calling his family is only permissible if he has given them permission to do so, Doing so would be a violation of both HIPPA and FERPA. If the family of this particular student believed that the professor “should have known,” then that brings into question what they knew - and whether they neglected their own responsibility to contact appropriate authorities to conduct a welfare check. Unless a college professor has taken a role as a mentor to a particular student, he isn’t likely to know an individual student’s warning signs. What appears to be deep depression for one student may just be the normal demeanor for another student. And depression isn’t the only risk - manic behavior (which may appear to some to be exhuberance) is often even more dangerous. It’s up to those who know the student best to notify someone if they are behaving oddly
Under FERPA:
Schools can contact parent if they think their student is in danger, and it may be school official’s observation or knowledge.
If you are paying for your student’s education and he/she is an dependent on your tax return then you can have access to your student’s education record.
It was why I never had to ask my kids to sign any documentations for me to give me access to their school information. I have also talked to their school officials without any problem.