Suicides is one of the leading causes of death for college students. Cerritos College held a suicide prevention workshop on Thursday, April 10.

The workshop’s main focus was about how to prevent someone from committing suicide. It also gave a lot of information such as statistics and videos of real life people who tried committing suicide.

Dr. Amanda Han, the consulting psychologist here at Cerritos College, said that the workshop “can help save one life at a time and educate people about facts and signs to look out for.”

According to the workshop, males are four times more likely to commit suicide than females. Also that minorities tend to have a higher chance to commit suicide.

Han also gave advice to students on how to help someone who is having thoughts of suicide. Some of the advice that was given was to show concern and understanding to the person who has thoughts of committing suicide, and to take these thoughts seriously.

This workshop was informative and helpful to the students that attended.

Ana Brown, psychology major, said, “I learned the steps like don’t be afraid to be direct and asking them ‘are you attempting to killing yourself?’”

As for Ramon Garcia administrative of justice major, she said, “There were a lot of facts that were startling.”

“Overall, I think the workshop basically provides ways to prevent suicides, ways to help out not only college students, but just society in general,” said Garcia.

When Han asked the question about how many people know someone who tried committing suicide and many students raised their hands.

Marco Gomez, psychology major, said, “It made you more aware like the statistics were pretty interesting, just to see the amount of hands that were raised in the room whenever she asked a question. It made it more relatable to me.”

While most of the workshops were just slides of information, Han did give students the opportunity to ask questions and input their thoughts on the matter.

For more information regarding prevention for suicides or for help visit the Student Health Center.