Taylor Wallace

Leaving her son Taylor at Columbia University made Angie Wallace nervous. But that’s almost every parent on college move-in day. She knew her child was intelligent. He would do well at Columbia. What she didn’t know, she asked the head of Columbia’s Counseling and Psychological Services (CPS). 

Wallace was concerned about Taylor’s mental health. He took Lexapro, a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI), to treat his depression. The head of CPS reassured Wallace, stating that many Columbia students took antidepressants.

By the second month of school, Taylor was miserable. He told her so every night from the isolation of his 90sq ft room on floor 14 of John Jay Residence Hall.

“He would FaceTime me at night and say, ‘You don't know how bad I want to jump out this window right now,’ said Wallace. “And I said, Taylor, don't say that. He's like, ‘I know, but I just don't like it. I don't want to be here.’”

It wasn’t the first time Taylor casually mentioned suicide. He shared everything with his mother. Because he talked about it, she never thought he would actually do it. The thought of returning home for Homecoming kept Taylor motivated. He fell into a dull, monotonous, routine: class then Netflix.

When Taylor finally returned to Brookfield, he had a revelation. The school he’d dreamt about since age nine was not a good fit. He withdrew and moved home on October 1, 2016.

At the end of the month, Taylor took his life in the basement. His 15-year-old brother administered CPR. At first, it worked. Taylor was temporarily revived, but he later passed away in the hospital.

Suicide is a public health problem.

Like many high achieving students, Taylor had underlying mental illnesses. Mental illness is a risk factor for suicide. According to the CDC, suicide is the second leading cause of death in late teens and young adults in the United States – and it’s getting worse. Taylor’s story is tragic, but it’s many students’ stories. College is a stressful coming-of-age experience for most young adults.

The American College Health Association estimates that more than 10% of undergraduates contemplate suicide. Mental illness, relationship issues, and prolonged stress can influence suicidal ideation. Ivy League schools are known for their stress cultures.

Ivy League schools are comprised of high achieving students that can be three times more anxious and depressed than the average pupil. This can result in elevated rates of substance abuse and delinquent behaviors. The academic and social design of Ivy Leagues creates a stress culture that aggravates underlying mental illnesses. Mental illness is a risk factor for suicide. When schools fail to provide effective mental health support, students die. 

Every school has tried to improve its mental health resources but many students continue to suffer in silence. Harvard, Yale, Brown, Princeton, Cornell, and the University of Pennsylvania have all been sued for wrongful death, negligence, or discrimination against mentally ill students. The courts are currently reevaluating laws regarding university culpability for student suicide. Failing to accommodate disabled and mentally ill people does not preserve the academic integrity of the Ivy League. It’s discrimination.

While student suicide is not a Columbia specific problem, I focused on tracking Columbia student deaths because it’s my alma mater. I collected suicide notification emails and cross referenced them with articles from various news publications.

Since Barnard and Columbia refused to release statistics, I tracked their histories of student suicide from 1902 to 2019.

Since 2016, ten additional Columbia students have committed suicide.

Most victims have been seniors, and winter break was the deadliest time of year. Six Cornell students killed themselves in 2010, and at least four additional students died after that. The nets under the Cornell’s idyllic bridges serve as a physical reminder of its history. Not to mention that Cornell’s longtime Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) lead committed suicide after starting a job at the University of Pennsylvania. The Daily Pennsylvanian reports that at least 14 University of Pennsylvania students have taken their lives since 2013. Harvard, Dartmouth, Yale, Brown, and Princeton do not release suicide statistics. Their deaths are harder to track because they did not receive as much media coverage.

There’s no “escaping” stress culture within the Ivy League.

Not many people have been an undergraduate student at two Ivy League schools — but Liam Riley was. By February of his freshman year at Columbia, he had completed several transfer applications. He found Columbia’s general education requirements, the Core Curriculum, particularly “annoying.” When he wasn’t working, he was with his sick grandmother. Visiting her three times a week while balancing Columbia’s Core was tough. The situation left Riley feeling incredibly unsupported by his school. Now, he’s a Yale grad. Riley believes transferring was worthwhile, but not in terms of the stress.

“I think people were working a lot more at Columbia and more sleep deprived,” said Riley. “I don't think that mental health was any better at Yale.” 

Riley says paying Yale’s student contribution is a huge obstacle for many people. He had to work a few jobs to pay off his $2,500 bill with his mother’s help. He explained that first generation students enroll thinking full financial aid means they won’t have to work. Then they struggle to juggle school, extra curriculars, and several jobs. At Columbia, Riley saw the Core as a major source of stress for first years. 

The Core is expansive and most classes count towards any major. Riley took 16 credits during his first semester at Columbia. He says Yale students are encouraged to take no more than 12 credits. This allows for little to no build up in rigor, which makes adjusting to the workload difficult. In 2017, Columbia reduced the credit maximum for Columbia College students without restructuring the Core. To “reduce excessive academic pressure,” administrators expected students to complete the same courses with less opportunities to do so. 

The Core Curriculum is designed to create a shared campus identity. According to Riley, it looks like “800” first years studying for the same exams simultaneously in Butler, Columbia’s 24 hour library. Almost every Ivy League school has a 24 hour study space. It’s where students forgo sleep and personal hygiene to study for days. The smell of body odor emanating from Butler is a reminder that productivity is more important than self care on Columbia’s campus. 

In 2014, Columbia students were the most sleep deprived in America. Despite Columbia Health’s emphasis on rest, Columbia Campus Services opened a 24 hour cafeteria. Barnard sells magnets promoting all-nighters in its campus store.

To help students budget their time, Columbia’s Center for Student Advising published a “Free Time Calculator.” Students hated it for a host of reasons. Most people need more than two hours per week to shower, groom, and do laundry. Its declaration that “free time is another time commitment,” epitomizes Columbia’s stress culture.

Stress culture emphasizes toxic study habits, not for the sake of learning, but for some level of social validation.

LEAVE CAN BE RESTORATIVE.

When schools hastily remove students from campus, they can land in potentially dangerous situations. Cornell almost sent a transgender student back to an unsafe, transphobic household. Fortunately the student was able to find lodging elsewhere on short notice. Quickly evicting students can make it harder for them to heal and seek care. This is counterintuitive, as schools often require students to be medically cleared before re-enrolling. It can be particularly difficult for people who are queer.

“Maybe you're in a small town where like finding a therapist that’s supportive of LGBT people is impossible,” said a Cornell student. “It's a vicious cycle.” 

Sometimes, staying on campus during leaves is best. When asked whether Harvard would knowingly send a student back to a toxic home, an administrator couldn’t say no. Harvard does not plan to offer alternative housing options for students on leave. The administrator reiterated that Harvard exists to disseminate knowledge. Harvard’s faculty may not support a “social service” like providing campus housing for non enrolled students. 

Stanford disagrees. As of January 2020, Stanford students can petition to “retain campus housing when on leave for a term.” Disability lawyer Monica Porter says the policy protects students from being forced to return to “unsafe or un-therapeutic” living situations. The new changes were the product of a class action lawsuit filed against the university. When Stanford students sought mental health support, they were coerced into taking “voluntary” leaves. If they didn’t seek support, they were punished. Stanford’s new approach is hailed for being “student-centered, compassionate, detailed, and transparent.” 

Miriam Heyman is a fan of the policy. She published a study on “leaves of absence for students who are experiencing mental illness.” It said Ivies’ leave policies were “ambiguous at best and discriminatory at worst.” Princeton and Yale have been sued for discriminatory leave. A Dartmouth student said his leave felt like a punishment for being depressed. Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, and Yale ban students from campus during leave. A Columbia administrator defended the school’s policy. They argued that removing students from campus invites them to build an identity separate from school. Columbia is aware that students violate this rule, but it’s not enforced.

Heyman said that severing students’ social support mechanisms can make it harder for them to heal. Several Columbia students have committed suicide while on leave. Liam Riley, Yale ‘19, suspects the same thing is happening at Yale. It’s hard to tell when schools don’t always report deaths that occur during leave.

Columbia administrators also insist that involuntary leaves are extremely rare. Heyman said that schools may be pressuring students to take “voluntary,” leaves. A former Columbia student was cajoled into a “voluntary” leave. She had suffered a mental breakdown and was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Columbia sent her home to live with a parent struggling with substance abuse. However, the school paid for her medical insurance. When she got better she reapplied to Columbia in June. She was rejected two weeks later. She said the situation made her feel like a liability.

Buzzfeed reported a similar story about a Brown University student who received a cease and desist letter during his leave. He was put on leave following a suicide attempt. Even though he sought therapy and excelled as a visiting student, Brown refused to let him reenroll. They rejected his readmission application five times. 

Forcing people to leave campus doesn’t exactly encourage them to seek help. A Dartmouth student who was suicidal said he’d never tell his school.

“They’re going to medically withdraw me,” he said. “They only ask you [if you’re suicidal] because then you become a liability issue.”

By forcing mentally ill students to take leaves, colleges send a simple message: If you’re going to kill yourself, just don’t do it on campus.

What is the state of campus care, and is it sufficient?

Silver, Brown ‘21, is psychiatrically disabled. They live with autism, anxiety, depression, complex post-traumatic stress disorder (C-PTSD), and dissociative identity disorder (DID). Silver spends thirty minutes walking to and from therapy every Wednesday. It’s usually cold outside. The busses in Providence, Rhode Island are often unreliable. While Brown has shuttles to address food insecurity and accessibility issues, Silver just wants a ride to therapy.

Brown’s existing mental health resources cannot help Silver. The school’s counselors are social workers and general therapists. None of them can remedy severe psychological disorders. It’s possible to specialize in treating a few disorders and still work as a general therapist. Silver says there’s no excuse for Brown’s failure to hire people who can serve those with severe mental health conditions.

Despite living with severe mental disorders, Silver only disclosed their depression to Brown’s Office of Disability Services. They want to keep their more serious disabilities off the books. Organ donors can legally discriminate against people with psychotic disorders. People with DID who receive personality integration therapy are more likely to get organ transplants than those who don’t integrate their personalities.

“If I can do something to get around that, I will always take that route,” said Silver, “it’s physically safer for me to do so.”

Even if they chose to reveal their other conditions to Brown, they couldn’t help. Most students can get a few campus sessions in before being referred off campus. But people like Silver are immediately turned away.

“Once you hit that moderately to severe mentally ill end,” said Silver, “they don’t have any resources for you.”

Brown is currently revamping its mental health system. As of 2017, Brown students are eligible for unlimited campus therapy visits. But Brown is the exception, not the rule. Despite a 30% increase in college counseling center visits nationwide, Harvard, Dartmouth, Princeton, Yale, Brown, Cornell, Columbia, and the University of Pennsylvania adhere to short-term models of care. It’s very common for students with longstanding trauma to exhaust campus therapy visits. If mental health support is proven to help students and they're willing to seek it out, why don’t Ivy League schools offer long-term campus care?

By adhering to a short term care model, schools aim to serve as many people in the shortest time possible. When asked about visit limits, a Columbia administrator said they’re a myth. The school’s Counseling and Psychological Services (CPS) has 35,000 visits per year. Columbia Health anticipates that a quarter of students across its schools will utilize CPS at some point. Their current staff of 50 clinicians isn’t large enough to offer unlimited visits for all students and see new patients. To avoid excessive wait times, people need to be discharged at some point.

Due to their inability to offer long-term care, Columbia and its peer institutions have built a robust network of referrals. People with Columbia’s insurance pay no more than $20 for off campus therapy. Given the cost and time of travel, campus care will always be the most accessible option for busy students. Once care is no longer affordable or convenient, people like Silver can fall through the cracks.

How do students cope?

Each student mentioned in this story noted stimulant abuse on their campuses. This came as no surprise to Dr. Carleah East. She’s a psychology professor and Mental Health Lead at St. Petersburg College. 

“You need to be worried about Xanax, Zoloft, Concerta, Adderall, and Ritalin,” said East. “Those are the ones they crush up and snort.” 

During her 18 years as a psychotherapist, Dr. East noticed that people create hyperactive behaviors and brains. She says society’s “fast-food mentality” compels students to use study drugs that aren’t prescribed to them. It’s a quick fix for workload problems, and a recipe for long-term health issues. 

“I say, ‘OK, well, I'm just gonna take this [drug] to study.’ I get off of it. Guess what? My brain is not producing as much melatonin as it used to because the chemistry of the brain has changed. So now I can't sleep,” said Dr. East. “Now I have to take something to help me sleep.”

She said that’s why students use alcohol and weed in excess to relax. The brain’s chemistry has changed, and its tolerance increases. People have to take more medicine to get the same effect. That can lead to a host of problems.

“Heart attack, stroke, panic attacks, dizzy spells, head migraine headaches, tourette-like ticks like rolling of the neck,” said Dr. East, “Those are things that also come out of being overmedicated or taking medications that are not prescribed to you.”

Liver dysfunction and kidney failure are among the worst health risks. Still, extreme pressure and wealth makes study drugs fairly accessible on Ivy League campuses. Sarah, a junior at Columbia, has been using study drugs since age 16. Her real name has been omitted for her protection.

Stimulant Abuse

In high school, ecstasy was Sarah’s study drug of choice. It was a crucial element of her mock trial practice ritual. A few lines before a mock trial tournament gave her team the fire they needed to win. It was nothing to Sarah. She had already tried weed, acid, coke, and Xanax. The most her mom did was confiscate her rolled up two dollar bill. It didn’t matter, she’d already been admitted into Columbia. The stakes were low, so she got sloppy. Sarah maintains she was never addicted, just bored. There was nothing else to do in Louisiana.

New York was exciting. Sarah didn’t need ecstasy as a freshman. Although her roommate spent eight hours a day in Butler “just to say she did it,” Sarah hadn’t succumbed to Columbia’s stress culture. Instead, she capitalized on it. While most Columbia students are initially hesitant to take study drugs, Sarah says desperation compels them to try. 

“This guy had to get very desperate for him to take the ecstasy from me,” Sarah said.

Sarah didn’t hit rock bottom until her sophomore fall. She was taking 18 credits. Smoking weed helped her manage her anxiety. ‘Twas the night before finals when she downed her boyfriend’s 15 mg immediate-release adderall with a cup of coffee. 

“I know if I do a certain amount of stimulants,” Sarah said, “I'll work through the night, take the tests, and be fine.”

When Sarah realized how lucrative Adderall sales could be, she bought 30 pills. She paid two dollars per capsule. Upon returning to campus, she began charging seven dollars per 15 mg immediate-release tablet. Soon, Sarah got a prescription for 10 mg extended-release Adderall to help with her fatigue. She dosed up every other day to stay a week ahead in class and still have time for guilt-free fun. Every pill she didn’t take got sold. By the end of the semester she was out of inventory. Midterm and finals seasons were quite profitable.

She says one customer would stash pills and give them to his friends. Most of her clientele were men. Women were more apprehensive about buying. She served people of all races and majors who were mainly juniors and seniors. So far, nobody has overdosed.

Sarah admits to doing more drugs than the average Columbia student. She believes they should be legalized. Columbia Health flyers discourage study-drug usage by indicating over 90% of students don’t use them. Sarah doesn’t think the posters are effective or accurate.

“They don’t work, first of all,” said Sarah. “Yes, prevent people from getting addicted [to drugs], which means reducing the stress culture.”

Basically, tackling stress culture is the best way to stop people from becoming dependent on drugs. Everything came to a head during her sophomore spring. Sarah had a psychotic break.

“I had started cleaning my room and all of a sudden I was like ‘I’m going to get rid of everything that I don’t need,’” said Sarah. “Within 30 minutes my whole room was in two huge garbage bags.”

She was hospitalized for five days. Sarah was diagnosed with depersonalization derealization disorder. Sarah believes she had the disorder in high school, but it became apparent at Columbia. It made her blank out and stare at walls for hours. She dissociated at random – even in class. Sarah says she’s in great health, but has trouble sleeping.

Sarah’s story exemplifies many of the phenomenons Dr. East described. At Columbia, she began using someone else’s Adderall prescription to keep up with academics. Due to her prolonged drug usage, her body built a tolerance to stimulants. Hence, she had to pair a 15 mg Adderall with coffee to feel its effects. She became dependent and needed her own prescription. Her stimulant abuse likely triggered an underlying disorder, which caused her to be hospitalized. Sarah finds it hard to sleep and smokes weed to relax.

STUDENTS COPE THROUGH INNOVATION.

Mahzabin Hasnath, Columbia ‘19, cried plenty of times at home, but never on campus. At least, not for a while. She is the oldest child to Bengali immigrants; born and raised in the Bronx. As a teenager, she woke herself up for school at 5 a.m., rode the bus alone, worked through her lunch period, and did her homework in the evening. She was accustomed to being self-sufficient, not vulnerable.

Coming to Columbia after graduating from the Bronx High School of Science meant going from “one stressful environment to another.” She often felt “small” in large introductory computer science classes. Knowing that many of her peers were far more experienced programmers was overwhelming. Next to none of her professors were women, much less women of color. They were mostly white men. Hasnath says the lack of representation and vastness of her classes made her feel like her problems didn’t matter. She preferred to cry at home until a difficult programming assignment brought her to tears at Barnard. She says the moment was “freeing.”

“It’s okay to need help,” said Hasnath, “I want someone to hold my hand and I will cry because I'm human and we have emotions. I won’t let anybody tell me otherwise.”

After that, being vulnerable with her professors became easier. Hasnath says she was most comfortable being open with her femme professors in humanities departments. For her final web design class, she created Crying @ CU. She described the website as a geospatial storytelling platform for life’s emotional moments. It was inspired by Crying In Public. Her platform allows people to anonymously tag places where they’ve cried at Columbia. Over 30,000 people have visited Hasnath’s site. She made the platform anonymous to stress the importance of human connection. By using maps, Crying @ CU encourages users to think about themselves in relation to others. It’s also useful to understand how and where people process emotions on campus. She admits the entire premise of her platform is “so millennial.”

“Our parents’ generation, they would never send out a tweet like, ‘Hahaha I’m gonna kill myself,’ said Hasnath. “It’s so nonchalant. But are we desensitized to it? Are we so used to going through pain that it becomes a funny tweet or ‘How can I monetize this for internet clout?’ How millennials process grief is really interesting to me.”

If she could change anything, Hasnath would increase empathy between students and professors. Universities create cold environments when they direct students to a policy rather than offering help and compassion. Hasnath says it makes people feel less inclined to be open.

“That’s when you have students suffering academically and emotionally,” she said.

By analyzing Ivy League students, the Surviving Ivy Mini Story discussed ways that institutions of higher learning mistreat, neglect, and discriminate against students experiencing mental illness. When that happens, parents like Angie Wallace and countless others have to bury their children. Universities are often people’s first homes away from home. They have a unique relationship with their students and a duty to provide care. 

Some students noted that lack of access to sunlight and green space makes them depressed. This is likely because Ivies are situated in the Northeastern United States. Most of the school year occurs during daylight savings time, in the cold. Dorms may not receive optimal levels of sunlight. Still, there aren’t enough studies to determine whether the spatial geography of college campuses affects student mental health.

Many of the people in this story have been sexually assaulted. It’s unclear whether students’ faith in college support for survivors is related to general levels of student stress. The data doesn’t exist. There are numerous studies about campus suicide, but few focus on elite schools. 

Most of the students mentioned were Black, brown, or identified as a person of color. The overwhelming majority of them came from poor or working class families.  Statistically speaking, they’re already predisposed to psychiatric symptoms. When these students seek care at school, it’s usually because they can’t get it at home. Answering their pleas for help with pressure to leave is classist.

I asked a Harvard administrator about its willingness to evict housing insecure students on March 7, 2020. By March 10th, they moved to forcibly evacuate undergrads during a health pandemic with less than a week’s notice. They did not cancel class. Dartmouth, Brown, Cornell, and the University of Pennsylvania also kicked their students out during their time of need. Actions like these explain why vulnerable students are often the most stressed.

Students with mental illnesses and disabilities needed virtual class before Coronavirus. It’s unfair to expect people like Silver to miss no more than two classes in a fifteen week semester. Universities transitioned to virtual classes within a week. They had the infrastructure to become more accessible. Yet, virtual classes are not offered as a disability accommodation. 

In light of Columbia’s suicides, I expected a host of wrongful death lawsuits. I found none. It’s unclear if people are too bereaved or too poor to sue, or if Columbia settled out of court. Current legal precedent doesn’t require much. If a college provides some level of suicide prevention and mental health services, it’s hard to successfully sue them for wrongful death. Cornell, Columbia, Harvard, and Yale have worked with the  JED Foundation to stop suicide. JED’s program is effective, but it ends in four years. Theoretically, a school could “finish” JED’s plan, fail to maintain initiatives, and still be a JED Certified Campus. This can happen if campus priorities change with leadership. JED s long term institutional investments in mental healthcare, but they can’t guarantee it. 

Courts do not require colleges to provide long-term psychiatric care. If they did, Ivy League schools have the capital to make it happen. Adjudication often means compliance, and that’s exactly how Harvard attempted to get Luke Tang’s case thrown out. Harvard knew that Tang had attempted during his freshman year. A year later, Tang committed suicide in his dorm. His lawyers allege that Harvard’s “negligence and carelessness” resulted in Tang’s death. Harvard argued that they complied with the duty of care established in an MIT case. Middlesex County Superior Court denied Harvard’s request to dismiss Tang’s lawsuit. Tang’s case presents an opportunity for courts to reevaluate institutional culpability for student suicide. 

If more people sue colleges for wrongful death, insurance companies will take note. Widespread sexual assault inspired insurance companies to hike insurance premiums for some K-12 schools. Colleges have similar insurance policies. Schools could be incentivized to take suicide more seriously if companies raised their insurance premiums.

Read the full story here