In other words...

Hello,

I feel that your page can be of tremendous help to teachers. My experiences with students and suicide are much the same, except that once we failed to rescue the student. It has been five years, and yet I still feel the pain as fresh and raw as new. Several things make it worse: I am the teacher that everyone comes to with problems. This student did not. Where did I fail? It is not certain that he was not coerced into suicide. this was a horrible thought and lead to many rumors and student distress and anger. Last, the students left grieved so. As a teacher I had to be their support, when I did not have a leg to stand on myself. I felt I had to control myself in order to help my students.There is no good answer to any of the questions such an event brings. I will leave with an attachment that I sent to teachers in teacher2teacher, a teacher to teacher help group (assuming that I can find it.).

Hello again to all.

I have been working on my lessons for next year, reading your posts, and trying to express my philosophy to others, both teacher and non-teacher. The teacher I did my student teaching with is no longer in teaching (he left for more money so his wife could stay home with a large family) but he had some priorities that I feel were, without question, correct.

He told me that the number one thing he wanted to teach was that Life Is Fun. It is so much better than the alternative. I did not exactly understand until four years later when one of my 8th graders committed suicide. The shock and distress sent through a whole school, from students to administration and other parents was tremendous.

As his teacher, I felt the same thing his friends did:shock, hurt, anger, and especially, guilt. Since then, I have done a lot of thinking and a lot of revamping of what I teach. I want my students to know that Life IS fun. Learning is fun. I want my students to know that they should hang on to life. I want them to know that they can come to me if they have problems. No, they don't all come to me, but some do. And I LISTEN. I may not be able to help, but I LISTEN. Sometimes this is the most important thing.

As you plan your next year, please plan in a little time to make the students realize that life is fun and worth living. Some of your students may live to thank you.

Kevin Barnard