Attempted Suicide and ADA Changes: Helping Students Stay Alive Jo Campbell and Abby Priehs Bowling Green State University March 6, 2015

No Conflict of Interest Commission for Counseling and Psychological Services (CCAPS) is sponsoring this program for American Psychological Association (APA) approved continuing education credits for psychologists CCAPS representative – Receiving credits – Certificates

Learning Outcomes By attending this session, participants will be able to:  Recognize the breadth of the college student suicide problem  Identify the changes in ADA Title II related to the direct threat to self standard  Learn how to apply lessons learned from institutions, who have had students filing Office for Civil Rights claims or lawsuits alleging disability discrimination after a suicide attempt  Elicit ideas from colleagues at other institutions to explore how they have established policies and/or protocols to handle suicidal students.

How Big a Problem Is College Student Suicide? Some Say It’s an Epidemic

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ADA signed into Law in 1990 by George H.W. Bush Capitol Crawl 2008 Amendments 2011 Final Rules

Americans with Disabilities Act Four categories of regulation governing disability discrimination:  Title I employment  Title II state and local government services  Title III public accommodations  Title IV telecommunications services

delegates to Assigns to Office for Civil Rights for ADA and 504 complaints from higher education (and others): Enforce Investigate Resolve Prior to changes in Title II, OCR used the direct threat standard of self or others in reviewing complaints and resolving ADA and 504 cases

§ Direct threat added to Title II effective in 2011 (a) This part does not require a public entity to permit an individual to participate in or benefit from the services, programs, or activities of that public entity when that individual poses a direct threat to the health or safety of others. (b) In determining whether an individual poses a direct threat to the health or safety of others, a public entity must make an individualized assessment, based on reasonable judgment that relies on current medical knowledge or on the best available objective evidence, to ascertain: the nature, duration, and severity of the risk; the probability that the potential injury will actually occur; and whether reasonable modifications of policies, practices, or procedures or the provision of auxiliary aids or services will mitigate the risk.

Mass Shootings On April 16, 2007, in what is the deadliest school shooting in United States history, Seung-Hui Cho shot and killed thirty-two students and faculty and wounded seventeen others on the campus of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech)

Mass Shootings Northern Illinois University February 14, 2008 Steven Kazmierczak Killed five and wounded eighteen

Two Wrongful Death Cases Turn the Judicial Tide: Duty Owed to Notify and Assist Elizabeth Shin Schieszler v. Ferrum College 2002 Shin v. Massachusetts Institute of Technology 2005 Michael Frentzel