I don't know; have most of the children who committed suicide left notes actually saying the reason was the pressure of school? Perhaps that is the case for some, but it strikes me as assumptive without actual confirmation.
I wonder the same thing. I also wonder - were these elementary school children who committed suicide or teens in high school?
I think it's really wonderful to look at how to improve the school experience for all students, whatever the reason - but I also think it's important to consider that it's most likely not *just* things not going well at school that lead a student to commit suicide. Home life, peer pressure, drugs/alcohol, mental health issues.
So.. coming from that perspective, I think that it's important (when trying to prevent future suicides) to include some way of recognizing children who are at risk. I don't think you could go through any one crowd of students and say that child is more likely to commit suicide than another, but you can identify portions of students who are at risk of having things not go well for the above reasons, and give them support. Just a few examples (none of which have anything to do with your school situation) - after school homework help or having the library open for kids to study who don't have a good place to study at home, programs to share information and discourage use of drugs/alcohol, teachers being trained to recognize signs of depression in a child, offering breakfast at school so kids from households that are struggling don't go through the day hungry, etc.
In any event, I think that in order to put in place change that will matter, you'll need to look closely at what seemed to be the cause of the specific suicides in your area as well as looking at what are considered to be risk factors in general.
polarbear
