Suicide is the second leading cause of death for college students in the United States, claiming thousands of young lives that were supposed to be just beginning.

At Gonzaga, not all faculty and staff are required to be certified in suicide prevention. It varies by department, leaving some employees better equipped to handle a mental health crisis than others.

We talk about campus safety in terms of well-lit paths and locked dorms, but the greatest threat to a student’s life often isn’t outside, it’s the silent crisis happening internally.  As students, our professors and campus staff are the people we see more than anyone else, more than our parents. They see the change in our posture, the sudden drop in our engagement, and the empty seats in the lecture hall. However, there is a devastating gap between seeing a student struggle and knowing how to listen to what they aren't saying.

Faculty members might feel the urge to help but are held back by the fear of "saying the wrong thing" or overstepping their professional role. I am not asking our educators to become licensed therapists or crisis counselors. I am asking them to become a bridge. When we provide suicide prevention training, we give our staff the tools to learn to listen. We teach them how to identify the subtle red flags that a student is in pain and, more importantly, how to respond with a question that could change everything.

We cannot afford to let "the second leading cause of death" remain on the backburner in our administrative planning. By empowering our staff to listen, and providing the appropriate training, we ensure that when a student is crying out for help in the back of a classroom, there is someone there who finally knows how to hear them. That when a student says, “I’m fine”, that there are adults who see beyond those words, and have been trained to respond.

My immediate request is that the Gonzaga University Office of Human Resources formally incorporate a mandatory 60-minute Gatekeeper Suicide Prevention Training (QPR) into the New Faculty and Staff Orientation curriculum, effective for the Fall 2026 onboarding cycle. My long term request is that Gonzaga University require the QPR training for all active faculty and staff.

The Question, Persuade, Refer Gatekeeper Training is a 60 minute training for which the certification lasts 1 year. The training is specifically designed for anyone strategically positioned to recognize a crisis - including faculty, staff, students, parents, and neighbors. Some key elements of the training are myths vs. facts about suicide, warning signs, practice and role-play, and local resources.