It has been a little over a month since school started back and this is only my 3rd or 4th visit.  I come to the 1st Block Freshmen English class from 8:30-10:03a every Tuesday and Friday.  Today the Cooperating Teacher has gotten a flat tire and instructed the (temporary) substitute to have me conduct class (working on laptops to fiinish a writing project) since I have been in class for two weeks and have a better idea of what is going on; I must make it clear here that I had NO prior knowledge to this decision until a student asked the “sub” a question and she directed the entire class to me–talk about SHOCK!

I was given a seating chart on the first day I visited and have been memorizing names and faces according to seats.  There has been a student (whose name must remain anonymous, but we will call him Cory Careless) who has–as I am told–been in ISS practically since the beginning of school.  This student reads and writes on a SIXTH GRADE level, has already failed TWICE, is in Special Ed. classes (because he’s remedial), and now he’s been out of class for nearly a month (give or take).  This student has already been told by the school that it is not a matter of “IF” he’ll get expelled, it’s a matter of “WHEN”.  Now he is sitting next to me with no excitement, no motivation, and no clue as to what is going on.  How am I supposed to become all those things for him?

I want to become a teacher because I want to make a DIFFERENCE in young people’s lives; I want them to know that at least ONE person is going to take them seriously.  I always wondered if a day like this was going to come, but I honestly have to admit that I NEVER thought it would.  The clock is ticking and this boy’s future hangs in the balance–did I mention that I’m not even a TEACHER yet?  My head is whirling, my heart is breaking, and I feel a sudden impulse to down my 20 oz. of coffee IMMEDIATELY.  I take only two gulps and approach this mellowed-out, lackadaisical student who’s presence can be smelled from 10 feet away (“this is NOT about ME,” I have to remind myself as I TRY to adjust to the smell and closeness of this student).

The assignment is to write a paragraph in 3-8 format on something from the book you have been reading for SSR (Silent Sustained Reading).  I ask Cory Careless which book he’s been reading and what it’s about (he hasn’t written any journals about it–I would know since I grade these).  Cory tells me he is reading “The Hoopster,” but he doesn’t know what’s going on; I ask him, “what page are you on now?”  Cory informs me that he’s on page 5………………..this is where all the blood rushes to my feet, my heart sinks, and I can’t catch my breath–anyone else want to throw anymore obstacles in here? I must admit I sighed a prayer here and had another swig of my double espresso latte–I should’ve made it a triple.  “Okay, well it sounds like it’s about basketball or something of that sort,” I reply, “is it?”

“Yes ma’am,” Cory says politely as he gives me his full attention.  I proceed to continue to ask him questions about the main characters, what he has read SO FAR, and what he thinks will happen.  As he dictates his thoughts to me, I jot down everything he says and make a brainstorming page (this was supposed to have been done yesterday, but at least now he’ll actually have a completed assignment for this first nine weeks).  I then find a graphic organizer the CT gave me a week ago and explain to Cory how we need to use our brainstorming page to come up with a topic.  Cory decides we should write about Sean, the main character, since the book’s about him.  After we create a topic sentence we discuss which three details we want to elaborate on and the supporting concepts or examples we will use to better express our thoughts in this paragraph.  I then explain to him how the concluding sentence in this paragraph should just BRIEFLY restate everything we’ve written.

THE PAPER IS DONE!  I am so relieved I just want to jump up on my desk and do a little happy dance, but for some reason I felt I would never be invited back if I did this, so I refrained.  After watching Cory sign on to his computer with the help of a gracious female student, I told him to take the graphic organizer and type everything out into a normal paragraph on Microsoft Word.  I then perused the classroom making sure everyone was actually doing work and asking of they needed any help.  Some students tried to pull the “I-don’t-know-what-I’m-supposed-to-write” card, but we quickly worked out the kinks as I had them get out their graphic organizer from Monday’s class.  With about 40 min. until 2nd block, I approached Cory with high expectation and assurance that he had finished typing–I couldn’t have been more wrong.  The blank page nearly blinded me as the cursor seemed to hit and make my head throb with its every pulse.  I resumed the position finishing the last of my latte and taking up the graphic organizer.

I continued by reading out loud to Cory the paragraph we had just written while he typed it out.  Time flew and we didn’t as each word was either misspelled or Cory couldn’t find the right key.  I seriously just wanted to cry.  The first sentence went down as the second followed a little slower.  Sentence three brought a twinge to my heart as it was typed out at a fairly decent pace–maybe this WON’T take so long after all, I thought to myself.  The fourth sentence dashed my hopes to the rocks and brought my head out of the clouds.  With the fifth sentence my patience began to wear. Sentence six–please God, only TWO more–my prayer stopped at the ceiling as the bell rang and Cory jumped up faster than I could say, “good job today!”

How do we make a difference, fellow teachers?  How do we take a month-long unit and make it comprehensive to a student in an hour and thirty minutes?  Honestly, I am still searching for these answers, but I have discovered that the first step is “caring”.  I haven’t seen Cory’s grades (or his journals for that matter) since that day, but I have had a heart-to-heart with his teacher and been informed that he has been coming to every class since and is no longer a problem student for her.  Could it be that I might have actaully achieved something in an hour and thrity minutes?  I don’t know, but what I do know is I look forward to my future career even more now than before the day Cory Careless came into my life.

The National Center for Injury Prevention and Control reports that in 2000, there were 3,994 suicides in the United States by people under the age of 25: 1,621 of those victims (41%) were 19 years old and younger while 300 were between the ages of 10 and 14 (p.39).

  The result of this being that suicide is ranked as the third leading cause of death among young people and, according to Fowler (2006), “the second cause of death of college students, claiming 1,100 lives each year” (p.1).  It has been observed that adolescent females attempt suicide 3 to 4 times more frequently than males; however, females have a tendency to use less lethal means like substance overdose and as stated by Dyer (2006), “consequently have a significantly higher survival rate” (p.39).  Whetstone (2007) states that, “suicide risk varies by gender, race, and age.  Fewer African American than white youth think, plan, attempt, or complete suicide.  Both completed suicides and suicide attempts increase with age from before puberty through adolescence” (p.2).  There are three distinctive major variables that are risk factors associated with adolescent suicide ideation and attempts, these are: family, environmental, and personal as well as depression (Whetstone & Cummings, 2007, p.2).

Family variables for suicide risk factors include things such as: family history of suicide, child maltreatment, parental psychopathology, and parental divorce (Whetstone & Cummings, 2007, p.2).  Due to adolescents mimicking what has been portrayed to them, adolescents who live with or are related to an adult/family who struggles with self-afflicted injuries and suicidal tendencies, are at higher risk for suicide ideation and attempts.  Adolescents who face child maltreatment such as abuse or neglect have high rates of depression and suicidal tendencies.  Some adolescents have to deal with the burden of having a parent with a psychopathic affliction carry the stress of taking responsibility for themselves and as well their parent, this also includes parents who abuse substances (e.g. alcohol) (Dyer, 2006, p.40).  Dealing with the physical, mental, and emotional changes of transitioning from childhood to adulthood and having the task of taking care of a partial or non-functioning parent results in large quantities of adolescents admitting contemplation of suicide and suicide attempts.  Adolescents caught between their parents’ divorce are found to struggle with anger, anxiety, depression, loneliness, and guilt which, if not confronted properly, can lead to the youth thinking, planning, attempting, and completing suicide.  Whetstone and Cummings went on to discuss that “children from single-parent families were more likely to engage in suicidal ideation; youth whose parents had less than a high school education were more likely to have suicidal thoughts and behaviors” (p.6). Though family plays a very big part in adolescent suicide risk factors, probably an equally big risk is the environment.

Environmental variables include access to fatal methods of suicide, barriers to treatment, and local epidemics of suicide (Whetstone & Cummings, 2007, p.2).  A popular way of committing suicide today is through medication overdose.  It is all over the media that if something is not panning out for an individual, there is always an easy way out.  With some medicines being so easy to obtain, adolescents are finding it appealing not daunting to over dose on meds so they can fall asleep and never wake up.  With as much popularity of suicidality that there is today in the Untied States, it is a wonder that suicide and suicide risk factors treatment is not more widely available to adolescents.  In society, therapy and counseling are, for the most part, looked down upon.  Although treatment is offered in schools and businesses, it is not highly encouraged by society.  Although colleges offer this choice, several of them are using a new get tough philosophy to handling on-campus suicidal students.  Just recently, a male fraternity student was asked to leave George Washington University in Washington, D. C. after attempting suicide without success.  According to Fowler (2006), the school’s spokeswoman speaks out that, “suicidal behavior not only impacts the student but the environment around him” (p.1).  The third leading variable risk factor for suicide in adolescents is personal variables (Whetstone & Cummings, 2007, p.2). 

One example of a personal variable is previous suicide attempts.  If an adolescent has attempted suicide before their sensitivity to it and fear towards it is lessened.  Dyer (2006) informs that, “external locus of control and a gender identity crisis (gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender issues),” were discovered to be major risk factors associated with adolescent suicide and attempts by a comprehensive search of PsyInfo psychology databases (p. 40). Another personal variable is a history of mental disorders.  Adolescents who deal with depression and anxiety view suicide to be an easy “cure” to their problem at hand.  Feelings of hopelessness and impulsive or aggressive tendencies are also risk factors for suicide among adolescents.  Youth concluding that there is no hope to be found in anything, seek suicide as the best way of ending the pointless madness society (Whetstone & Cummings, 2007, p.2).  Whetstone and Cummings (2007) observe that. “a larger percentage of children with below average grades reported suicidal thoughts and actions than those with above average grades” (p.6).  According to Dyer (2006), Adolescents with aggressive or impulsive behaviors pose a threat to themselves, especially in cases where they are exposed to firearms (p.40).  To sum up the personal variables for risks factors for suicide, physical illness and feelings of isolation are the last two listed in Whetstone’s and Cummings’ (2007) article Children at Risk: the Association Between Perceived Weight Status and Suicidal Thoughts and Attempts in Middle School Youth.  They go on to argue that adolescents, more specifically female adolescents, are concerned about their weight and their need to “fit in” in society.  Whetstone and Cummings (2007) state, “Suicide is one of the most common causes of death for those with anorexia nervosa and is more frequent among adolescents and young adults than among the general population” (p.2).  Other risk factors observed by Dyer (2006) included serious childhood loses, a lack of reasons for living, substance use, a lack of social support, low self-esteem, loneliness, physical or sexual abuse, and depression (p. 40).

 Dyer (2006) observes, “depression has been found to be the most frequently reported risk factor associated with adolescent suicide and suicide attempts.  An examination of depression and its relationship to the other identified risk factors revealed that it was significantly correlated with suicidal ideation and attempts and most of the other identified risk factors” (p.40).  Depression has become major illness in the United States with “major depression affecting 3 to 5 percent of children and adolescents” (Bhatia & Bhatia, 2007, p. 1). Depression affects anyone no matter what age, gender, or race, however adolescent depression will be focused on in this research. Depression has several negative impacts on adolescents such as: impact on growth and development, school performance, and peer or family relationships and it may lead to suicide (Bhatia & Bhatia, 2007, p.1). One way help an individual coupe with depression is through prescription of antidepressant pills.  In many prescription drug overdose suicides antidepressants have actually been the drug of choice if individual has them on hand.  Bhatia and Bhatia (2007) warn that, “all antidepressants have a black box warning because of the risk of suicidal behavior (p.1).  How then does society begin to treat depression in such a way that it no longer becomes an avenue for suicide, attempts, and ideation?  Dyer (2206) suggests that assessments be made off adolescents to determine if they have depression and efficient treatment be made ready and accessible (p.40).

            In every article there was a concern and need for suicide prevention and intervention.  According to extensive research in Whetstone and Cummings’s (2007) article, they suggest or a more guarded approach while Dyer’s (2006) article gives suggestion such as, “crisis centers and hotlines, general suicide education, school and community gatekeeper training programs and peer support programs, hospitals and police as community gatekeepers, intervention after a suicide in the community, and screening programs” (p.41).  There are numerous factors leading to the ideation, attempts, and completion of suicide.  The three major risk factors associated with adolescent suicide ideation and attempts, as listed by Whetstone and Cummings (2006) are: Family, Environmental, and Personal Variables (p. 2).

References

Bhatia, Shashi K., and C. Bhatia. (Jan 1, 2007). “Childhood and adolescent depression.(Disease/Disorder overview).” American Family Physician 75.1. Retrieved Feb 22, 2007, from http://find.galegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&

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Cowen, Tyler. Aug 29, 2006. Why people die by suicide. Retrieved Feb 22, 2007, from http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2006/08/why_people_die_.html.

Dyer, Fred J. (Nov 2006). Adolescent substance abuse and suicide: substance use often linked to suicidality, but dynamics vary [electronic version]. Addiction Professional. 4.6, 39-41.

Fowler, Joanne. (Dec 18, 2006). “When there’s nowhere to turn. (SUICIDE ON CAMPUS).” People Weekly, 66.25. Retrieved Feb 19, 2007, from http://find.glaegroup.com/ips/infomark.do?&contnentSet+IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A155616843&source=gale&srcprod=STOM&userGroupName=swu_main&version=1.0.

State of Missouri Department of Health and Senior Serves. Focus…Suicide attempts and suicide fatalities. (Feb 1999). Vol. 32.12. http://www.dhss.mo.gov/FOCUS/Feb99Vol32No12.html.

Whetstone, Lauren M., Susan L. Morrissey, and Doyle M. Cummings. (Feb 2007). “Children at risk: the association between perceived weight status and suicidal thoughts and attempts in middle school youth.” Journal of School Health 77.2: 59(8). Health Reference Center Academic. Retrieved Feb 19, 2007, from http://find.galegroup.com/ipsinfomark.do?contentSet=IAC-Documents&type=retrieve&tabID=T002&prodId=IPS&docId=A158907083&source=gale&srcprod=HRCA&userGroupName=swu_main&version=1.0.