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MIT alum from the early 00s here. The administration did very little to make mental health services available to students, did its best to cover up rather than

MIT alum from the early 00s here. The administration did very little to make mental health services available to students, did its best to cover up rather than face issues, and generally seemed not to give a shit about students' stress, which is why it had the highest suicide rate in the country. People would joke about how the school colors were "blood and concrete" because of people killing themselves jumping off tall buildings on campus, which happened frequently. My personal experience, when I had a rough early semester, included no offer of mental health services although I was severely depressed, although an administrator did advise me my academic career was over thanks to my poor performance and I would never get into grad school. I suppose this is good prep for a world full of bitter, uncaring, unfeeling people. MIT was a great place in many ways, but this was not one of them.

xxxyy 12y ago
Did you consider seeing a psychiatrist outside the school? Depression is absolutely not specific to MIT students.
- astazangasta 12y ago
  I did later, yes.
gumby 12y ago
MIT alum from 1980s here (and former nightline staffer). I am disappointed to hear that NL shut down. We did get non-MIT callers, but the fact that we had dormline (probably doesn't exist any more either -- student-run internal phone system) and no mobile phones limited its reach. There were some horrible suicides back then too, and pretty much everyone had at least one all nighter per week. If I remember the Institute had pretty good mental health services for its time, though I doubt it had free, indefinite length psychotherapy or everyone would have been on it. But despite the grind I had a really really good time. Perhaps it was because I was (AFAICT) in the bottom half of my (tiny) high school so showed up never worrying about how I was doing compared to other students. The Institute, at least back then, was impersonal and basically uninterested in undergraduates (not anti-, just didn't care). For me that was liberating: I could take classes in pretty much any department, and if my transcript was a mix of 5.0 and 3.0 that was OK since I was learning a shitload every day. As an undergrad I got to take a lot of graduate seminars and I got to spend a LOT of time in the lab (a majority of my last two years).

xxxyy 12y ago

Did you consider seeing a psychiatrist outside the school? Depression is absolutely not specific to MIT students.

astazangasta 12y ago
I did later, yes.

gumby 12y ago

MIT alum from 1980s here (and former nightline staffer). I am disappointed to hear that NL shut down. We did get non-MIT callers, but the fact that we had dormline (probably doesn't exist any more either -- student-run internal phone system) and no mobile phones limited its reach. There were some horrible suicides back then too, and pretty much everyone had at least one all nighter per week. If I remember the Institute had pretty good mental health services for its time, though I doubt it had free, indefinite length psychotherapy or everyone would have been on it. But despite the grind I had a really really good time. Perhaps it was because I was (AFAICT) in the bottom half of my (tiny) high school so showed up never worrying about how I was doing compared to other students. The Institute, at least back then, was impersonal and basically uninterested in undergraduates (not anti-, just didn't care). For me that was liberating: I could take classes in pretty much any department, and if my transcript was a mix of 5.0 and 3.0 that was OK since I was learning a shitload every day. As an undergrad I got to take a lot of graduate seminars and I got to spend a LOT of time in the lab (a majority of my last two years).