Dubai: Reacting to the latest incident, Dr Mohammad S. Tahir, a psychiatrist who is also director of the American Wellness Centre, said that considering the social pressures and performance anxiety issues that many students face, schools should periodically conduct counselling.
School in shock after three deaths in three years
“Schools must invite psychiatrists to create awareness of mental health issues, and tailor programmes according to the needs of their students in active collaboration with parents,” Dr Tahir said.
He also suggested that schools design questionnaires for students that could potentially reveal any underlying mental health issues.
“Based on the result of these questionnaires, the school can identify high-risk groups. Usually these are students who are introverts, isolated, have low self-esteem, have anger issues, fare poorly in exams and exhibit other such symptoms.
“Schools need to monitor such students and have special counselling sessions with them. Only when this gap is filled will we know why our students are committing suicides, acts which we could [potentially] prevent,” he said.
