PennSTART for all

In today's DP, Ernest Gomez discusses a new pilot project for Wharton and Engineering freshmen that hopes to help students better handle mental health issues, such as anxiety and depression both of which are highly prevalent among college students.

According to a national survey of 13,500 college students published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2005, 45 percent of undergraduates reported experiencing depression severe enough to prevent them from functioning day to day.

According to Counseling and Psychiatric Services, more than 10 percent of Penn students meet with a counselor at CAPS each year. You do the math: Either Penn students are less prone to depression than the average college student, or many cases go unreported every year.

I definitely agree with the columnist in encouraging freshmen in Wharton and Engineering to take this seriously and to not simply disregard the program thinking that they don't need help.

I could've benefited from PennSTART, but I probably would have cast it aside as a crutch for the weak-willed.

This is why I have a message for Wharton and Engineering freshmen: Get over yourselves - you're not the best, nor do you have to be. It's great that you're raising the bar of collegiate success, but you're not invincible. Give PennSTART a chance.

I also have a message for the administration: If the program proves initially successful, make it mandatory for incoming students a la AlcoholEDU. Distant rewards and raffle prizes will not motivate busy students to take the program, but an ounce of PennSTART is worth a pound of CAPS.

PennSTART is a great compliment to the work being done by student groups, such as the Mental Health Coalition, to better educate students about mental health issues and dispel the many myths about CAPS.

But, what about College and Nursing students? I understand that this is a pilot program and that the administrators and professors spearheading this effort want to determine its efficacy but College students deserve the chance to participate if they want. Why not just open it up to all Penn students as well?

~BT