cwsmithsonian.org

“Here I am, typing aimlessly, hoping to exorcise my demons,” a despondent 19-year-old Elizabeth Shin wrote before setting herself on fire in her MIT dorm room in April of 2000. Firemen at the scene found her engulfed in flames. She died a few days later from her injuries.

Her suicide came after eleven others at MIT in as many years, Now, two years after her fiery demise, MIT is trying to exorcise its own demons — charges in a lawsuit filed by Elizabeth’s parents that the school could have prevented their daughter’s death. Already, people are pointing to a study which found that 74% of MIT students suffer from emotional problems which interfere with their daily lives. While MIT did provide counseling and other services for Elizabeth, her parents claim that the school could have done more. She could have been hospitalized, put on stronger medications, or sent home. Somebody should have been watching her, they say, and someone should be responsible for her failure to cope with life.

The Shin lawsuit, along with recent suits at Brown and Syracuse, may push colleges into reexamining their suicide prevention efforts. That’s a good thing – any young death is one too many.

But the prospect of a large financial settlement may have a broader effect than just spurring colleges to add more counselors. Right now, there’s a battle being fought at many colleges over the relationship between the school and the student. Is it a paternalistic relationship, in loco parentis, in which colleges have a duty to save students from their own harmful behavior? Or are college students adults who should be responsible for themselves?

Our affluent culture has indulged itself by extending adolescence long past the age when previous generations moved out on their own. College students are seldom financially independent. The strange limbo between legal adulthood and actual self-sufficiency allows colleges to impose various “for-your-own-good” rules, if they wish. Many colleges, up until now, have tried to strike a balance between independence and in loco parentis.

If a jury delivers a large financial verdict in the Shins’ favor, however, the scales may tip toward the paternalistic side, and not for the better.

to be continued…