Editor’s note: Suicidal thoughts and behaviors can be reduced. If you are in crisis, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or text TALK to 741741.

The Rowan University student was sleeping in her dorm room when it happened two years ago. In the middle of the night, another student killed himself nearby on the Glassboro campus.

“It really struck me and I think about that a lot. Somebody felt like there was no other option that they had than to take their life on campus," said the student who spoke on condition of anonymity. “It’s devastating, especially because at times I’ve pictured the same thing happening to me.”

She’s not alone. This semester, Rowan University has "suffered more losses than ever before,” college President Ali Houshmand said in a statement Thursday night after a student was left in critical condition after what the university described as a “fall” from the privately-owned parking garage on Rowan Boulevard earlier that day.

It happened less than a week after another student killed himself on Nov. 29.

“We have had three students die by suicide this semester, but we also have lost several other members of the University community due to other causes,” Houshmand said in a statement Friday. “While even one death is one too many, so many losses in such a short time have been shocking.”

Now, students, faculty and administrators are scrambling to prevent another tragedy, stemming from a national mental health crisis that’s especially prominent among teens and young adults. A university-wide meeting is planned for Monday to "provide support and resources for coping near the end of a semester,” Houshmand said.

Meanwhile, a growing debate about the state of mental health services on the South Jersey campus is roiling. Administrators say they have nearly tripled the number of mental health counselors over the last seven years from four to 15. Three more are scheduled to be added next semester.

The faculty union president said he believes administrators are trying to address the problem but said the counselors, who are part of his union, don’t have adequate facilities and resources to meet a growing need.

Semester-long waitlist

Some students dispute school administrators’ claims that services have improved and are raising their voices with spontaneous protests and an outpouring of complaints on social media. A candlelight vigil, organized by the students, was planned for 8 p.m. Friday at the student center.

“While I’ve been here, there have been at least five different student suicides,” said the student, now a senior, who asked not to be identified. “Students have to wait for up to a semester to be seen. It doesn’t feel accessible and they ended up getting care elsewhere.”

Rowan officials said campus incident reports that keep track of crime, including sexual assaults on campus, do not track suicide. They said medical privacy laws also block them from discussing details of care, including if any of the students who have killed themselves had sought treatment on campus.

The young woman went to the university’s Wellness Center for her anxiety issues prior to the classmate’s suicide in 2017, but concluded this spring it wasn’t working. She resorted to finding help with a private mental health provider outside of the university.

Scott Woodside, Rowan’s director for student health services, said changes were made earlier this year to address some of the complaints about delays in treatment. Students with mental health issues are evaluated and typically treated individually or in group sessions, he said. Any student in crisis is seen at any time of day, either by phone or in person, he said.

Woodside said Rowan will add three more mental health counselors during the next school semester starting in January. He said the college is well within guidelines from the International Accreditation Counseling Service of one counselor for every 1,000 to 1,500 students.

“The waitlist is one of things we’ve worked hard to eliminate,” Woodside said this week. “We do not have a waitlist going forward.”

A Message from President Houshmand: Earlier today we shared the sad news of a male student’s fall from the parking... Posted by Rowan University on Thursday, December 5, 2019

Demand for services

Rowan officials said they believe rising stressors on students to pay for college with spiraling student loan debt and part-time jobs may be contributing to the unprecedented demand for treatment for anxiety-related illnesses.

The number of suicides among people ages 10 to 24 nationally increased by 56 percent between 2007 and 2017, according to a new federal report. The rate of suicides in that age group rose from 6.8 deaths per 100,000 people to 10.6, according a report by the National Center for Health Statistics.

Ben Locke, the director of student counseling at Penn State University and executive director of the Center for Collegiate Mental Health, said there is also an increase in the rate at which students are seeking services.

“There’s a far greater effort to talk about issues across the board," Locke said. "Students are now more willing than ever to acknowledge what’s wrong and ask for help. In this scenario, we can end up with a shortage of services. Every suicide is a tragedy.”

We have to do more

Part of the challenge is the booming growth of Rowan University, which has nearly doubled its enrollment over the past 10 years to 15,500 on campus and more than 19,000 total students. It is one of 11 public colleges and universities in New Jersey.

Joe Basso, president of the university’s American Federation of Teachers, said the mental health counselors who are part of his union are pressed by cramped working conditions at the Wellness Center in Winans Hall, a building that also has classrooms.

He said he wonders where those additional counselors will work because the current staff has no offices of their own and are competing for exam rooms.

“As union president, it’s my job to bring light to these problems,” Basso said. “If we want to be part of a solution we have to do more, we simply have to do more.”

A university official said Thursday temporary and then permanent fencing will be erected along the platforms of the garage and campus police will begin to patrol them.

“We must strive to draw together as a university family in times of crisis and respond with compassion for those around us,” Houshmand said in a statement Thursday.

Student Government Association President Arielle Gedeon echoed the sentiment

“I hope students continue to seek help,” she said.

Editor’s note: Suicidal thoughts and behaviors can be reduced. If you are in crisis, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or text TALK to 741741.

READ MORE: More N.J. teens are killing themselves in a crisis nobody was prepared for

Bill Duhart may be reached at bduhart@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @bduhart. Find NJ.com on Facebook. Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tips.

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