After meeting with many students and administrators over the past two days to examine the stresses of student life at the College, Psychologists Belinda Johnson, head of counseling at Brown University and Ilene Rosenstein, head of counseling at University of Pennsylvania left the College yesterday.
In the wake of four Dartmouth student suicides in the past year, the College Health Services asked Johnson and Rosenstein to come to Dartmouth to explore how stress levels on campus can by minimized and to examine the resources the College offers to help students deal with stress, Director of College Health Services Dr. Jack Turco said.
"The program was a response to the series of suicides at the College," Turco said. "We wanted to bring in a couple of objective observers to look at how we do things here."
According to a BlitzMail message sent to students who met with the experts, the psychologists will compile a report about their findings and submit it to Dean of the College Lee Pelton.
The psychologists spent the past day-and-a half gathering information which they will organize in a report that will be provide insight on how the College can better deal with stress, Turco said.
"They will be giving the College feedback as part of a bigger picture on how we can minimize stress," he said.
Turco explained that Johnson and Rosenstein's findings will be examined in a broad context and incorporated into different areas such as programming, education and clarification on how to better deal with stress and those contemplating suicide.
"We are not simply expecting a list of 10 to 12 things the College can do to deal with stress more effectively," he added. "We are looking at stress internally and fitting it into the big picture."
Johnson and Rosenstein garnered information on stress at the College through meetings held with student groups and administrators.
Students met the psychologists on Wednesday night in Collis, Turco said.
In addition to members of campus leadership organizations, members of minority organizations, undergraduate advisors and members of the Student Assembly also participated in the discussions.
The psychologists led the discussion to get a feel for what the stresses are at Dartmouth, where students perceive these stresses to be centralized, where students turn to get help in coping with stress-related issues, and whether their are holes in the system the College uses to handle stress and personal tragedies, Turco said.
Monica Oberkofler '96 said the four students in her group were asked various questions on general life at the College and what we find stressful at Dartmouth, she said.
The psychologists "wanted us to create an idea of what life was like at Dartmouth," she said. "We talked a lot about our personal experiences and about the groups we represented," Oberkofler said.
The group discussed stress generated by factors such as the D-plan, alcohol and academics. They also broached the effectiveness of student-administrator communication at the College and where students went for advice or support, she said.
