People are going through struggles that they don’t talk about. In fact, a college campus can be a great breeding ground for depression as a result of 3 main attributes:

1) The me-ism culture of college: (Networks like facebook and twitter have made this more prevalent: People are more concerned with showing their best selves, and fooling everyone into thinking they are completely okay. We're more obsessed with updating our statuses than partaking in meaningful human interaction.)

2) The expectations students try to meet & pressures we face (family, health, work, academics, etc.)

3) Past experiences that affect a student’s mental image and present-day relationships

In this project, we want to represent the various struggles that we each go through and provide a platform where every individual’s struggles can be heard.

Here is how the project will work: students ANONYMOUSLY drop off their stories, and actors collect these stories and work on them. Actors from the theatre department will put on a play based on these stories to represent the struggles and voices that either go unheard or are undermined.

If you would like to contribute your story,

there will be drop boxes at the front desk of Erickson hall (and other resident halls pending approval)  where you can anonymously drop off your stories without your names on them, unless you want to be contacted.

You can also anonymously electronically drop off your stories in the online suggestion box with the following link:

http://freesuggestionbox.com/pub/ikchwqn

If you are wondering what exactly to write, you can start by just responding to the question: how are you doing?  How are you really doing?  The answer does not have to be profound but honest. If you are fine with writing more, you can answer the question: what are you struggling with or what have you recently struggled with? How has it affected you? How has it changed your behavior? A sentence such as “I feel lonely” does not provide enough information to work with. Please provide enough information about what you are going through that we can represent your struggle more accurately than not.

Which stories will be used?

Depending on the number of stories we get, we’ll focus more on the first batch of stories we receive. The two other kinds of stories that might be irresistible to perform are recurrent stories and oddly striking stories.

We will be working in collaboration with SGA, reslife, and perhaps counseling and health services to use these stories in one way or another to improve student life. This means that even if your story does not get told in the production, it can still be used to make a difference.

Share your story!http://freesuggestionbox.com/pub/ikchwqn