By Tara Bahrampour, Ruben Castaneda and Lori Aratani
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, April 24, 2006

Weeks after a bright, popular junior at Albert Einstein High School shot himself in the head, another junior there committed suicide Wednesday by stepping in front of an oncoming train.

Their deaths, in addition to the death two months ago in a possible suicide of a former Einstein student, have rattled the tightknit Kensington school community. Although some parents of Einstein students had yet to hear of Wednesday's incident, others were connecting the three deaths and expressing concern about the stresses of teenage life.

Chatter spread on blogs, with stunned students wondering how the deaths could have happened and whether they could have done anything to prevent them.

On Thursday, Einstein Principal James Fernandez gathered the junior class in the auditorium to announce the death of Elisabeth Stanford, 16. He made a similar announcement to members of the senior class and brought in grief counselors and a crisis team to talk to students.

"It's so difficult to make an announcement that a student has died," he said. "You don't know how kids are going to take the news."

At 4 p.m. Wednesday, Stanford, of Silver Spring, stood on the train tracks in Rockville as a CSX train approached, police said. Since then, the teenager's family and friends have struggled to understand why a thoughtful girl who was enrolled in the school's prestigious International Baccalaureate program and who dreamed of becoming a wildlife biologist would end her life so violently.

On March 5, Kanishke Karunaratne, 16, also of Silver Spring, shot himself in his bedroom. He was also in the IB program, which prepares students to pass a series of exams to earn a diploma that is accepted at universities internationally. He was also captain of a team that appeared twice on WNBC's "It's Academic" competition.

Neither had given any indication that anything was amiss, their families said.

Standing in the doorway of her brick house, Stanford's mother, Sherri Odegaarden, said yesterday that she was shocked by her daughter's suicide. The midterm grades she received Wednesday, a few hours before she died, were not what she was capable of, Odegaarden said, but on her report card, Elisabeth wrote, "This has nothing to do with grades." It was the only note she left, her parents said.

About two years ago, Stanford began seeing a therapist for problems her mother said involved "philosophical teen angst" unrelated to academics.

Uday Karunaratne, sitting in his living room decorated with Asian artwork, described Kanishke as "the perfect son" and said he shared his parents' dream that he would one day attend Oxford University in England. His fallback choices were the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard and Stanford universities.

The teenager liked to play violent video games, which concerned his parents so much that two days before his death, his father forbade him to play them. The next day, Karunaratne took SAT preparation classes from 2 to 6 p.m., and the following day, he slept unusually late, until about noon, his father said.

Uday Karunaratne said he told his son to wake up and noticed that his son's computer screen was damaged. His son pointed to the computer and said, "This ruined my life!" his father recalled.

After leaving to check his e-mail, Uday Karunaratne heard the gunshot. Kanishke had found his father's .22-caliber handgun and turned it on himself. Uday Karunaratne said that he and his son used the gun for target practice and that he thought he had hidden it well.

Kanishke's sister, Samantha, 18, a student at the University of Nottingham in England, said yesterday that she believes a combination of academic pressure and the sudden denial of her brother's outlet -- video games -- may have made him snap.

"Of course, my parents didn't like [the games], but when they took that away, he didn't have that release," she said.

Karunaratne left no note, but his father said he believes that academic pressure played a role in his suicide. He called the Odegaardens to console them after Stanford killed herself.

Some parents said this weekend that three deaths occurring so close together has them worried that the pressures of academics and teenage life are too much for some kids to handle. In February, a former Einstein student was killed by a train in an incident that his father said has been a ruled a suicide. The father said he does not believe the ruling. However, parents at the school said the three deaths and the connection to trains have left them unnerved.

"I'm really, really concerned about this -- particularly after the second one," said Karen Schulz, the mother of a recent Einstein graduate and a psychotherapist for adolescents and their families. "I'm concerned that kids will start to see this or view this as an acceptable way to solve a problem," she added.

"Something is terribly wrong here," said Kay Romero, the mother of two Einstein graduates and an incoming Einstein freshman. "Is there too much stress on kids?"

Schulz and other parents, including the Odegaardens, said they do not blame the IB program. Schulz said she worries that "there's a certain contagion factor, that [kids will think] this is how we solve problems -- and it's not."

Neil Bernstein, a Bethesda adolescent psychologist and the author of "How to Keep Your Teenager Out of Trouble and What To Do if You Can't," said that although three incidents are probably not enough to term it a contagion, parents do have some cause to worry.

"In general, with any trend, with each occurrence the likelihood of another occurrence goes up," he said, adding, "Teenagers are highly suggestible -- there's no question about that."

Noting that the rate of teen suicide has been fairly stable in recent years, he said that stepping in front of a train is highly unusual for teens and that most take pills, a method more likely to fail.

Officials of the 140,000-student Montgomery County school system would say little about the deaths or comment on academic pressure. "Any suicide is tragic," Superintendent Jerry D. Weast said. "My heart goes out to the families."

Two days before Stanford's death, Einstein's Parent Teacher Association hosted a program on helping students deal with academic stress.

Fernandez said that students were "sad and concerned" and that several teachers were also deeply affected. He said that the school will operate as normal but that the deaths will not be ignored.

Hundreds of people attended a vigil for Karunaratne a few days after he died, and fellow students spoke of how he would stay up until 3 a.m. helping them with their schoolwork, determined that they understand it, his father said.

Stanford's funeral will be held at noon today at Collins Funeral Home in Silver Spring.

Over the weekend, friends of Stanford shared their confusion and sorrow on xanga.com, a site where some students post their Web logs.

"What is it about life?" one person wrote. "Why do people feel the need to give theirs up?"

Wrote another: "Why does it seem like as soon as we start to heal, something else goes wrong?"

Staff writer Dan Morse contributed to this report.