Parents of the HS Class of 2015

@NorthernMom61 I’m sure that the directly affected students are getting help. From what I heard, last night the suitemates were spread among the lounges on the 3rd floor and they had people (likely mental health professionals) up there with them, talking to them. I think that there were going to be people around in one of the buildings today if anyone needed help.

Yeah, I know it’s unlikely that we’ll know everything.

That is good to hear @albert69.

I saw an article on it; 18 years old. Very sad that kids feel so pressured to go to college (you can argue that “maybe that wasn’t it”, but if anything else is going on in someone’s life, going off to college is probably not the best thing to do…). I am waiting for someone to break the news that going to college at 18 is NOT the best idea for many kids, yet many of those kids still go.

http://www.kansas.com/news/local/article40513005.html

This story I found while looking for the other story is amazing, you don’t hear that much about heroes:
http://www.kwch.com/news/local-news/wsu-student-dies-while-trying-to-prevent-isis-suicide-bombing/33286728

Sadly, it has been a busy year at WSU - this articles mention it was the first homicide on campus in more than 20 years (and apparently targeted):
http://www.kansas.com/news/local/crime/article30610167.html

I was concerned that my son had lost weight since I saw him in August, but he seems happy and calm. He saw some friends over the weekend, even drove the car a bit. I know some things disappoint him, but he likes the academics for the most part, and is handling it well. So far, it looks like he’ll get better grades than he finished with in HS.

@rhandco This is at least the 3rd student death at WSU this calendar year - the guy you mentioned, who got shot walking from Fairmount Towers (the other dorms) just the week before I moved in. We actually had a distant connection to that guy, though we didn’t know until later. He was a roommate of one of my dad’s coworker’s sons at NM State - he’d transferred here for last spring semester. He was a Saudi national, from what we heard, a real nice guy according to the coworker’s son.

Someone also apparently committed suicide in Fairmount Towers last year, and it wasn’t until the smell of the body became noticeable that someone found out.

Stuff just happens, I guess.

It is heartbreaking. Just plain heartbreaking.

That is incredible heartbreak for the family. To send your child off to start their new exciting life… only to have it end just weeks later.

I came here with a problem that somehow doesn’t seem to be so awful now.

Does put things in perspective.

@albert69 sending good thoughts to all on your campus and to the family of the student. It can feel so devastating to all involved, I hope that people can find help and strength together.

FWIW I heard that while suicide among college students gets more press, it’s actually less common among students than among the total population of 18-24 year olds. The biggest risk factor for that age group seems to be unemployment. http://www.sprc.org/sites/sprc.org/files/library/YouthSuicideStudentStatus.pdf

@LadyArwyn I would be concerned, while it’s not a life-and-death problem, it’s still awful to be living in a room with someone who doesn’t seem trustworthy.

When it rains, it pours… things keep happening, but for a strange reason I’m not feeling too distressed. I’m probably still a little in shock. I will break and have a good cry sometime, I reckon, I just haven’t had the trigger yet. Tuesday morning, my lab partner in chemistry nearly passed out because she felt sick. Then that night we had the first actual drama between two of my suitemates… two stressed people, one said some stuff about the way that the other one kept her stuff on the sink without realizing that she was in her room, so she came out and defended herself and attacked the other one for talking trash about her, saying if she had a problem with the way she kept her things she should tell her to her face… and she had a point, I admit, in her shoes I’d have done the same thing… and then the first one felt REALLY bad because she’s not that type of person. I tried to calm her down, and discovered that she’s really got family drama bothering her - a mother/father split and an ensuing custody battle over her younger siblings. She just got caught in a moment of projection and stress and started venting, I think. The other suitemate accepted her apology, and I think things will be fine.

Arrgh, and now I seem to have caught an insomnia bug.

Something funny happened to me today, I was talking with some people on my engineering graphics team and someone pointed out that one of the guys was from Florida. He was like “how could you tell” and they were like “all the UCF shirts you wear and such.” I was like “so can you tell I’m not from Kansas?” And a couple of them were like “really, you aren’t?” Lol. :wink: Maybe I fit in here. It’s the first place I’ve heard Alabama blasting from someone’s car. It’s funny, I like country music, but in NM usually people would laugh if I said that. Here it’s not exactly predominant, but no one thinks it’s strange.

Goodness, it’s getting wild here… the bank in the RSC (student union building, essentially) was robbed today. 3 pm, broad daylight, by some guy who threatened the workers. No weapons involved, thankfully. Some of one of my friend’s friends were interviewed as potential witnesses.

And we had more fire trucks tonight, though luckily only because of a steamy shower.

@albert69 That’s crazy! I’m sure your parents have been worried. When I was in 8th grade the bank across from the school was robbed and the robber came onto school property.

@readingclaygirl I was Skyping my mom when I noticed the crime alert in my email and read it out loud to her… so yeah. She knows college campuses aren’t safe, so that’s not exactly news.

@albert69 doesn’t help that there have been several incidents within the space of days though. Make sure to be vigilant about taking care of yourself.

@Northernmom61 Thanks, I will.

DS injured his hand in a machine shop today and will likely be put in a cast at a follow-up appointment tomorrow morning. We are extremely relieved as it sounds like it was a very close call to something much worse. He was also quite upset with himself. He will be fine with all class requirements except he will not be able to play his horn for marching band, probably for the rest of the season. Marching band is a class but he really doesn’t want to attend all the rehearsals and games for the rest of the season if he can’t play. He has an A right now but is thinking of withdrawing from the class (W on transcript) and will talk to an advisor before the deadline this Friday. (He was actually getting quite fed up with it anyway so he wouldn’t be upset at all by withdrawing.) My inclination is that it won’t make any difference down the road for an engineer to have a W for marching band in his freshman year but I have no actual experience with this. Thoughts?

I can’t imagine that it would matter if he drops band, especially given the circumstances that it was due to an injury. Too bad to lose that A to his GPA, but that is probably inconsequential as well if he is doing fine in everything else. Better a W than an F.

Sorry to hear about the injury though, but glad that it wasn’t as serious that it could have been Yikes. Life sure is messy sometimes.

@STEMFamily … Sorry to hear about your DS’s hand. Hopefully everything heals up fine. I don’t think the W on the transcript will have any negative effect in the long run, but I’d make sure the advisor looks at any short term implications for scholarships i.e. potentially dropping below full-time status, how a “W” figures into GPA regarding minimum for scholarship renewal and SAP, etc.

If he’s still prior to the drop deadline it may have no impact at all, but we’ve had no personal experience with it so I’m not sure. Good call having him check with the advisor first. :-bd

@STEMFamily - sorry to hear about this mishap. It seems best to withdraw as he would get little out of the class and I also can’t imagine it looking bad on his transcript. S ‘broke’ his right thumb a few weeks ago but then it was miraculously healed a week later (possibly first xray was misread but it went missing). It’s hard when you’re not close by to assess the situation.

@STEMFamily… glad it was not worse than it is. I think a withdrawal would be the best… the W on the transcript will be easily explained and for good reason I think?

In other news… looks like DH is losing his job on Friday. UGH. Is there any point in calling the financial aid office? Not sure of severance or anything yet, should probably wait for that, but if he is getting severance is there any chance of getting them to offer aid for the second semester, or would it only be possible if there is no severance? My head is spinning…

Thanks everyone. Second opinion this morning was that no bones are broken so the prescription was just ibuprofen and ice, no cast, and hopefully the swelling will be down in a couple of days. Told him to report back if any fingers start feeling numb. It’s a much better diagnosis, but he still won’t be able to play for a week or so. From his perspective, the upside is that his audition for Drum Corps shouldn’t be impacted. And maybe he will be more careful in the shop.

@writes1994 Sorry to hear about your DH. I don’t have any clue about financial aid.