And Grad Students Vote Blue

The current issue of U.S. News & World Report says that incidents of mental illness among graduate students is high and rising. One grad student at Berkeley examined the breadth of the problem at UCB. Her findings: "Nearly half of the students said they'd had an emotional or stress-related dilemma that significantly impaired their well-being or academic performance in the past year, with 54 percent of all students experiencing depression and 1 in 10 having seriously considered suicide." U.S. News & World Report, April 11, 2005, p. 54.

If only half of the grad students at Berkeley have mental problems, we're surprised. We're also inclined to think that's a drastic reduction from the 1960s and 1970s.