rfeo ([info]rfeo) wrote in [info]ucberkeley,
@ 2006-10-19 01:03:00
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Physics Prof. commits suicide
Michael Ronan, Physicist and Professor, Dies in Fatal Fall
A UC Berkeley physics professor and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory senior scientist was found dead at the lab Tuesday afternoon hours after telling his students he was suffering from depression.

Daily Cal article.

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[info]hoyah
2006-10-19 08:13 am UTC (link)
:x that was sad...

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[info]fiberpunk
2006-10-19 08:14 am UTC (link)
If a professor commits suicide, all his graduate students give straight As for the rest of the semester.

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[info]kritios
2006-10-19 08:15 am UTC (link)
"Fatal fall" is a pretty indirect/euphemistic term to use when the rest of the article is talking about his depression.

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have a nice 'trip'
[info]conceptual
2006-10-19 09:23 am UTC (link)
yeah really, when I read 'suicide' I do not expect the explanation to be 'falling'

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[info]cousin_cletus
2006-10-19 08:24 am UTC (link)
good god... this year has a pretty high mortality rate... wtf?

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[info]kiviera
2006-10-19 08:29 am UTC (link)
Well...fuck.

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[info]ebonyandsnow
2006-10-19 08:44 am UTC (link)
...you gotta love Berkeley. That and it's wonderful support system.

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[info]prolesurge
2006-10-19 02:29 pm UTC (link)
There was an article in the Daily Cal a while back that listed all the student suicide rates for all the UCs, and we were nowhere near the top. So, the school isn't doing everything wrong.

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[info]iamthescientist
2006-10-19 04:10 pm UTC (link)
who is the highest?

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[info]cousin_cletus
2006-10-19 04:47 pm UTC (link)
i wanna say cornell, but i don't know the stats.

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[info]cdm137
2006-10-19 06:38 pm UTC (link)
Cornell has a bad reputation, but it's actually not that bad anymore. Besides, the above poster was referring to just UCs.

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[info]chasingred
2006-10-19 09:54 am UTC (link)
thats absolutely horrible. i hope his family can get through this.

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[info]sfthai25
2006-10-19 03:21 pm UTC (link)
I was really sad when I found out. He was such a nice guy :(

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[info]aquacutie16
2006-10-19 04:07 pm UTC (link)
This is so sad. :( He was such a nice guy, very helpful during office hours and would always stay after class to answer questions. His goodbye to our class was a big shock because he didn't seem like he was depressed. I hope his family is doing okay...

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-19 04:17 pm UTC (link)
he was teaching physics 8a.. maybe all those freshmen pre-meds got him depressed.

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-20 02:43 am UTC (link)
see, "most freshman don't take 8a" does not mean there's not significant number of freshmen pre-meds in his class. With 330 people, even a minority portion can drive him to jump off a building.

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[info]ashveerps
2006-10-20 04:10 am UTC (link)
wtf? Why? Is it because the 20 pre-med freshman in his class just make teaching unbearable? But I can understand how even one person can make something suck, in the same way you consistently do here.

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[info]ashveerps
2006-10-20 02:37 am UTC (link)
Nice one, tard. Most freshman don't take 8a.

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[info]tinytangent
2006-10-19 07:55 pm UTC (link)
i wish i could have gone to office hours more often. he was a really compassionate and caring guy.

this is quite shocking and unexpected.

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[info]misworded
2006-10-19 10:33 pm UTC (link)
So sad. The worst part is this:

Following his announcement to the class, Ronan spoke to The Daily Californian yesterday about 2:30 p.m.

"I wanted to say goodbye to the class," he said. "I had troubles and just couldn't handle it and just came to the point that I just had to give up. I'm just depressed."

When somebody is that depressed, isn't suicide an extremely obvious threat? My God, people are dense. It was like he was saying to the world, "Yep, I'm about to kill myself!" I keep thinking this could have been prevented if anybody had cared enough to check in and see precisely how depressed he was, and whether or not he felt he was a danger to himself. I'd kill myself too if I were that depressed and nobody seemed to care about me.

Sorry for the rant, but this kind of hits close to home.

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-19 11:59 pm UTC (link)
there's nothing daily cal could have done. 5150 only covers actual attempt, not intention.

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[info]cdm137
2006-10-20 12:25 am UTC (link)
I think the department could have done more about this. Presumably he had already informed the department that he was not going to continue teaching the class due to personal reasons. One of the staff or one of his colleagues should have tried to find out if he was OK and if he was any danger to himself.

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-19 11:58 pm UTC (link)
"Physicist and Professor, Dies in Fatal Fall"

LOLLAWOFGRAVITYPWNED

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[info]cdm137
2006-10-20 12:20 am UTC (link)
idiot

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-20 12:37 am UTC (link)
the university shoved 330 people in his physics lecture, each paying $3000 per semester for on average 16 units. So it rakes in almost $1million dollars for 60 hours of instruction (25% of it done by GSI's with no teaching skill). That's $16500 per hour for someone with very little teaching talent.

I'm a victim of this ripoff. Surely I'm morally justified to jest in his death, the same way one jeers at thieves who trip and fall.

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[info]cdm137
2006-10-20 12:43 am UTC (link)
He wasn't hired to teach, he was hired to do research. I don't think it's somehow his fault that you believe that he was inadequate as a teacher.

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-20 12:50 am UTC (link)
i didn't say anything about his salary. he was an part of a thiefing scheme.

god i can't wait to graduate asap and get the fuck outta here.

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[info]semianonymous
2006-10-20 02:26 am UTC (link)
Why don't you do yourself and the system a favor and get the fuck out now. If it's such a rip off, why are you here. Go somewhere else. If it's so not worth it, quit wasting my money (taxpayer) and let someone else in who wants to be here.

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[info]ragnus
2006-10-20 02:44 am UTC (link)
because i need to graduate to go to law school?

why shouldn't i waste your money if i can?

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[info]chasingred
2006-10-20 06:26 am UTC (link)
so then essentially its not a rip off if it can be used to get into a good law school.

dumb ass.

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[info]nyucknyuck
2006-10-20 11:11 pm UTC (link)
Don't bother; ragnus is an idiot that we should all simply ignore. (How he continues to take this sort of slander is unknown to me.)

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question
[info]queenkv
2006-10-21 07:37 pm UTC (link)
Why did it take so long for the mainstream media to get on this story? It seems like a big deal for me. Why did it take so long for the SF Chron to pick up the story? Hell, the Oakland Tribune is on the same side of the bay as Cal and they didn't post a story?

Why doesn't UC Berkeley or Lawrence Labs have a press release on what happened?

It's a tragic death and I'm shocked it got buried by the university and the mainstream media.

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