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The first death occurred before the school year started. In July 2021, an undergraduate student at Worcester Polytechnic Institute was reported to have died. The government sent out a notice via email with well-known, thoroughly vetted language and additional resources. Catherine Hu, an assistant professor in the Department of Integrated and Global Studies, said she felt particularly devastated when she heard the news. She taught this student. He was Chinese, and she empathized with the particular pressures he faced. She looked through old anonymous course reviews, looking for signs she might have missed. But she didn't know where to put her personal feelings about the loss she had suffered in this professional situation.
A second student died the week before the school year began. An up-and-coming senior in the computer science department who loved gardening took his own life. This foreshadowed disaster. A student's suicide is a tragedy. Two could be the beginning of a cluster. Some faculty members began to feel a tinge of fear when they set foot on campus.
Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts is an orderly New England college campus with the saturated landscape typical of a well-funded university. The hedges are neatly trimmed and the paths are neatly swept. The 19th-century red brick building has a tall glass façade and renovated interiors. However, within six months, a number of people committed suicide, and the school changed completely.
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Additional production for The Sunday Read included Isabella Anderson, Anna Diamond, Sarah Diamond, Elena Hecht, Emma Kelbeck, Tanya Perez, and Krish Seenivasan.
