The University Counseling and Psychological Services is hosting suicide prevention training in an effort to make the University community more aware of some of the warning signs of suicide and possible methods to grapple with these symptoms.
The issue of suicide prevention saw renewed attention last semester, when three male students — second-year students Peter D’Agostino and Connor Cormier and fourth-year student Hunter Smith — committed suicide.
Andrea Iglesias, assistant director of outreach and liaison programming for CAPS, said the training is open to everyone in the University community but is being promoted primarily among faculty and staff. The ultimate emphasis, she said, is informing community members of how to best help those in need.
“The focus of the training is to help members of the U.Va. community be better able to identify warning signs that someone might be considering suicide or someone who might be needing help,” Iglesias said. “So it’s both raising some awareness around these important warning signs and risk factors, and also learning how to intervene or how to respond.”
Iglesias said said she could not comment on any specific student deaths, but that CAPS is very focused on addressing suicide prevention.
“It’s been a very high-stress environment and I think a lot of students have been feeling impacted by loss that we have experienced as a community, and that, in a lot of ways, can make us more vulnerable,” she said. “We want to make sure we’re providing community members with tools to be the caring community that we want U.Va. to be.”
Iglesias said suicide prevention is a community effort, since many people struggling with depression or thoughts of suicide do not seek professional mental health support.
“A lot of those people won’t ever make it through our doors,” Iglesias said. “Our hope with trainings like this is to help have more eyes out there, more people who are trained and have the awareness to recognize warning signs and intervene.”
Iglesias said the three upcoming suicide prevention training sessions are just one of the outreach initiatives CAPS is currently putting on. Furthermore, she said CAPS is interested in working with the University community to develop additional measures and training sessions.
In addition to hosting two additional upcoming suicide prevention training sessions on Thursday, Jan. 22 at 4 p.m. in the Newcomb Gallery and Wednesday, Jan. 28 at 4 p.m. in Nau 101, CAPS will be hosting free mental wellness screenings Feb. 19, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. in Newcomb Hall 360.
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