‘It was horrible. It came from nowhere’: When schools cope with the suicide of a student

The first time guidance counsellor Clare Finegan experienced the death of a child by suicide at school, everything stopped.

“It was a small school community, and the child was well known to all year groups. Both staff and students were traumatised by the suicide,” she said. “I didn’t know the child, nor did he cross my path, but I felt an irrational guilt that I didn’t get a chance to make a difference.”

Other guidance counsellors from the area were invited to come and support the school community over the following days. It gave everyone, she says, time to grieve in a safe and compassionate manner.

On other occasions, in different schools, she had different experiences. Rather than an open and inclusive approach to a suicide, management tried to contain everything inside the school walls and return to normality prematurely.

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There was, she says, no time or space to reflect on the shocking reality of the loss of a child.

“I felt that a sense of silent shame descended on the school,” she said.

In all, five young people took their lives in schools during her professional career. Each left its awful imprint, she says, and prompted her to undertake the first research study in Ireland into the impact of suicide on school communities.

The report, published by Dublin City University, highlights gaps in support for schools and a disconnect between what staff say is needed on the ground and official guidelines produced by the National Educational Psychological Service (Neps).

The research also identifies the emotional impact of suicides on guidance counsellors as they try to “hold it together” and support others.

“Oh God, it was horrible, and it came from nowhere,” said one interviewee.

Another remembered the immediate reaction in the school when word filtered out. “You could hear it actually, as the news broke, just the wall of grief ... I’m brought right back to it”.

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Guilt and regret

The study quotes a guidance counsellor who reported how he continued to see the student who died in the faces of others at school. “There are boys who I see who would walk like him ... the paleness in the face like him ... I find when I think of that I take a sharp intake of breath,” said one.

There was also guilt and regret among many over what they felt were missed opportunities to intervene. “It was horrible ... the fact that he had come to me, and I did what I could for him ... the fact that I knew him personally,” said one.

“I would have loved to have seen him that day,” said another. “I felt like I had a connection ... I would have loved to have had that better.”

Others spoke of a need to be endlessly available to students in the weeks and months after a suicide, and the fear of repeat occurrences.

“You wanted to be there. I wanted everything to be safe ... you’re doing 40 hours ... just because you wanted to be there. I wanted everything to be safe.”

The lingering effects of suicide among school staff were felt by many.

“It scarred me profoundly ... because I’ve lived those experiences now and the scars are on my back,” said one interviewee.

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Guidance counsellors reported in many cases a lack of inclusion in decision-making over the handling of the school response to a suicide, as well as a lack of empathy from school managers over the scale of support needed and the negative consequences of official guidance to “continue as normal” at a time of crisis.

Official guidance, for example, emphasises the need to present an “image of being in control” to children from the outset, she said.

“To visibly aspire to appear in control can only be a set-up for chaos if people are not in a state of readiness,” Dr Finegan said.

In these cases, she says, there can often be a “tsunami of students” at guidance counsellors’ doors long after the response to a suicide has been implemented.

Revised guidelines

Dr Finegan, now a psychotherapist and clinical supervisor, as well as a guidance counsellor in Greystones, Co Wicklow, said the study’s findings provide recommendations which, if implemented, could help better serve the needs of school communities.

The need for a review of the efficacy of Neps guidelines to support and ensure safety is key, she said, as well as an external evaluation of school responses to suicide.

The gap in psychological services needed to meet the needs of distressed students also needs to be addressed urgently, she said.

Neps, which has responded to about 150 “critical incidents” in schools over the past 20 years, said in a statement that it works with teachers to identify students most in need of support and helps develop procedures for reviewing their needs and supporting referral, if necessary.

It said it has developed a range of workshops and webinars on promoting wellbeing and resilience, as well as an e-learning course on responding to critical incidents, which was rated by more than 90 per cent of participants as very or extremely satisfactory. It said there was an inbuilt review process as part of the Neps critical incident guidelines for schools.

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Dr Finegan’s vision is that revised guidelines will be informed by those with first-hand experience – the guidance counsellor, the teacher, the caretaker – who are often the first responders to a suicide.

“They are left to carry the duty of care to other vulnerable children impacted,” she said. “They have the insight, from the ground up.”

Meanwhile, the scale of the problem is daunting. Suicide remains one of the leading cause of death among young people in Ireland, with more than six in 100,000 teenagers taking their own life each year, latest figures show.

Dr Finegan hopes the research will prove a spur to help bridge gaps in mental health services for schools to support young students.

“I cannot speak for all schools, but my participants’ experiences of what happened to them and others as professionals and first responders to school suicide give an insight that needs to be heard,” she said.

If you need information about mental health supports or services, speak with a GP, visit yourmentalhealth.ie, or call the HSE YourMentalHealth information line (1800 111 888) at any time of day or night