Another rant on mental health

[kellinator]

From the August 23, 2004 issue of Newsweek:

"MIT admissions dean Marilee Jones says she's looking to enroll 'emotionally resilient' students. 'If we think someone will crumble the first time they do poorly on an exam, we're not going to admit them,' she says. 'So many kids are coming in, feeling the need to be perfect, and so many kids are medicated now. If you need a lot of pharmaceutical support to get through the day, you're not a good match for a place like MIT.'"

Wow, how wonderful to see such sensitivity in a person working with teenagers.

There are so many things that offend me about this statement that I don't even know where to start. Are Prozac and Ritalin overprescribed? Certainly. Are there students with mental health issues who would be better served in smaller, more supportive environments than the pressure cooker of MIT? Without a doubt. Is it fair to expect universities to bear all the responsibilty for the problems of troubled students? I don't think so. Do some of these students need to just suck it up and deal? Probably. But still...

To me, what Dean Jones seems to be saying is, "There's so much pressure on students to be perfect, and we want to make sure they can do it without drugs. Because, you know, it's not real if you can't do it without drugs. Antidepressants are for wusses."

What about diabetic students who need insulin? Technically, that's pharmaceutical support. Can you imagine the outcry if Dean Jones said this, and rightly so? I believe they have something called the Americans with Disabilities Act that says you can't do that.

Perhaps MIT is trying to dodge some of the responsibility it must bear for creating an environment where suicides and nervous breakdowns are very real issues. They may be legally adults, but most eighteen-year-olds aren't ready to deal with extreme pressure, especially on top of huge life changes like college usually involves (moving, being away from your support network...). Maybe MIT doesn't feel that expending funds on decent mental health care is a worthy use of their dollars. Never mind the old adage that says "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."

During a final exam at the end of my first semester of Vanderbilt, I burst into tears and left the room to sob for twenty minutes. I got an A on that exam and went on to graduate summa cum laude. I suppose Dean Jones would have called me one of those problem students and rejected my application?

Or maybe I'm just bitter because I couldn't cut it in my grad school experience (at a school whose mental health services were much harder to obtain than those at Vanderbilt). So let's think over some of the others with mental health issues that MIT might pass over. Lincoln, Beethoven, Churchill, Van Gogh, just about every great writer of the twentieth century... would you tell them they couldn't come to your school?

EDIT: the1mouse has helpfully provided this link to the article.

Comments

[theashifaction.livejournal.com]

while she was thinking on a grander scale of mental instability, youre paring her comment down to imply she'll reject the entire medicated populace. shes not trying to discriminate against mental disorders, shes trying to take preventative measures in situations where students and parents are too focused on the prize that they refuse to take into consideration the inevitable in some cases.

take into consideration the armed forces. there is a psych exam involved in the higher elite fields to determine who may or may not freak out under pressure, and thats acceptable because ultimately the safety of all involved is at stake. MIT is in the same caliber as special forces. they have a responsibilty to discern who can and can not actually live through the process.

[wintersweet.livejournal.com]

MIT is *not* in the same category as the special forces--no other lives depend on your performance.

[theashifaction.livejournal.com]

on your performance, no. on the possibility of you ending up on a clock tower with a semi automatic rifle? yes.

[gaiagurl.livejournal.com]

mit doesn't need to be that stressful, period. the point is they aren't the special forces. people don't go to their school to learn how to be elite soldiers or airmen. they go there to be educated. education is a personal process--how it got turned into this great bastion of competition is way beyond me. yes, reward people for their efforts, but that shouldn't require overwhelming the entire student body with pressure they probably won't experience to nearly the same degree at any other time in their lives.

[theashifaction.livejournal.com]

saying MIT doesnt need to be that stressful is like saying harvard doesnt need to be so selective and the olympics shouldnt be so hard.

[gaiagurl.livejournal.com]

nope. i can differentiate between academic selectivity, physical prowess and stressing the hell out of people just so they can brag about the expensive education that cut thirty years off their life expectancy.

albert einstein was the elite of physicists in his day and i bet he didn't have to be turned into a drooling mental patient to get to that point, either. you can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear... so there's really no point in destroying the sow's ear, is there.

[dwivian]

Actually, people go to MIT to be the elite of the engineering world. If you just want an education, go to your local trade school or state college. If you want to be the best of the brightest of your generation's tech people, you have to be in the graduating class of MIT.

[gaiagurl.livejournal.com]

doesn't matter. you're still not there to learn how to engineer under the stresses of battle, bullets and bombs flying at you, whatever. it's engineering for pete's sake.

[dwivian]

Special forces don't want to be out there under bullets and bombs, either. They are strike forces that pre-empt combat, when possible. It's just demolitions/surgical-strikes/recon, for pete's sake...

Designing heart valve replacements is just as stressful as setting up a listening station, and comes with the same sense of personal satisfaction when you get it right, and the same worry about injury to others when you fail.

[kaifawn.livejournal.com]

What about those who go to MIT with the goal of entering aerospace? Those who work in Mission Control dealing with life and death situations after being on duty for 18 hours straight? Those who fly the shuttles? And that's just one industry.

I wholeheartedly disagree with the notion that MIT is an education with the same trials and tribulations of any other education.

[dwivian]

You obviously haven't seen the research that MIT does... and pretty much every student is expected to be involved in some project before graduation.

As a friend of mine who went to MIT said to me, "sometimes it really DOES matter what the fifteenth digit of /e/ is." She never did explain that, either....

[ex-poonarif.livejournal.com]

I agree...MIT is hardcore education. If you can't cut it, don't go there. Period. Some of the smartest people in the world attend MIT and are successful.

I don't think the school will turn down anyone who is on meds, but will turn down people with a significant mental disability....and by doing this, they cut down on people having to be hospitalized for mental issues that might not stem from attending MIT, but are heightened by the experience there.

In the long run, the school is a great place. I've lived in Boston, and MIT does great things. I really don't think they have a policy of descrimination. :)

[crowyhead.livejournal.com]

they have a responsibilty to discern who can and can not actually live through the process.

Thius may be true, but by focusing on those students who "need a lot of pharmaceutical support to get through the day," she's missing the boat -- she should be worried about the people who AREN'T getting the care they need.

[theashifaction.livejournal.com]

those people arent going to get accepted either. this is mit for christs sake not ucla.

[crowyhead.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, but that's just not true. If it were, people like Elizabeth Shin, the MIT sophomore who set fire to herself in her dorm room, wouldn't have been accepted in the first place.

[theashifaction.livejournal.com]

thats what im talking about. UNDER THE NEW POLICY.

[thystle.livejournal.com]

and if she had no past records of mental illness?

[theashifaction.livejournal.com]

im imagining the tests to be like that one scene in Armegeddon.

[crowyhead.livejournal.com]

Bullshit. Unless we're literally talking about an admissions policy that's going to be as thorough as admissions into the secret service, all it's going to do is encourage people to keep everything even farther under wraps. Shin reportedly had a history of depression, which she kept secret from everyone involved.

If someone equally driven is aware that anything other than an appearance of happy, healthy mental stability is going to keep them from getting into MIT, then they're going to do every in their power to appear that way. All statements like Jones' do is further stigmatize those who are under treatment for depression or mental illness, and further encourage deception on the part of those who might need treatment but are afraid of the consequences of seeking it.

[the1mouse.livejournal.com]

I want to wade in here, but I don't like taking quotes out of context... could someone scan and post the whole article???

[kellinator.livejournal.com]

I tried to link to the article in my original post but it was only available from the Newsweek website for pay. The article was about depression on college campuses and I quoted that part exactly as written. The rest of the article mainly focused on the steps other universities are taking to deal with the problem, which in my opinion makes MIT look even more short-sighted.

[the1mouse.livejournal.com]

I think I found it... This one didn't ask me for money: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5626585/site/newsweek/

[kellinator.livejournal.com]

You rock. I will edit to include the link.