Quiet, alone, and in her dorm room; Jeanette Foster ’03 died in much the same way she lived at Macalester.

Foster suffocated herself with gas in her Kirk Hall single the morning of May 14, two days after her class’ commencement ceremony. She chose not to walk the stage with her classmates.

Foster’s action appeared premeditated and her timing was intentional. Several hours before her body was found, she sent an e-mail to her confidant and former advisor Associate Professor of Psychology Jaine Strauss stating her intention to end her own life and her hope that she chose a time that would minimize the effect of her suicide on the Macalester community.

“It was clear that this wasn’t a five-minute decision… It was clear that she had a plan,” said Dean of Students Laurie Hamre, who initially discovered Foster’s body after receiving a call from Strauss.

By the day of Foster’s death, most students and some faculty had departed for the summer and the dorms were nearly empty. Nevertheless, the news of her death spread quickly and harshly jarred the college, which was already reeling from an aggravated sexual assault on campus and the arrest of a student on child pornography charges, both just weeks before the suicide.

Macalester’s administration held an informational meeting in Weyerhaeuser Chapel at 1 p.m. the day of the suicide to inform the community of Foster’s death. Despite the summer departures of most students and some faculty, the Chapel’s pews were nearly full.

Incoming Macalester President Brian Rosenberg, who was introduced to the community and the media at a press conference the morning of the suicide, attended the meeting.

Foster’s death was not the only recent tragedy in Foster’s nuclear family. Foster’s mother lost a long battle with cancer when Foster was a senior in high school.

“Jeanette’s mom was a really important influence in [Jeanette’s] life, a kind of steadying force,” Strauss said. “It was hard for her not to have her mom around during these turbulent years of college, especially graduation time.”

Foster, a native of Fargo, North Dakota, is survived by her father, brother, and sister.

Although Foster was not well known in the broader Macalester community, she was a familiar face in several circles. She participated in events held by Students Against Rape and Sexual Assualt (STARSA) and the Macalester Association of Alternative Spiritualities. She was also very interested in Asian art and culture and enjoyed kung fu and painting with a strong Asian influence.

African Music Ensemble was Foster’s extracurricular activity of choice. She participated in the ensemble for three years and took private music lessons with the ensemble’s director, Soa Mensa, for two years.

“I will always remember how much she was willing to help,” Mensa said.

Mensa also valued Foster’s openness to self-improvement, both musically and personally.

“Her willingness to make adjustments and improve in music and life was amazing,” Mensa said. “Her first year in Ensemble, it was rough, but she got better and better at group interaction.”

Foster left a letter to the ensemble in her room that thanked the group for allowing her to participate in something she really liked. She also wrote in the letter that she hoped that the group would think of her every time they sung her favorite song “Adwah,” an upbeat funeral piece.

Foster also felt very comfortable in the Psychology Department.

“She was a totally dedicated Psychology major,” Strauss said. “I think she really found a home [in the department]… And we really appreciated having her around.”

According to Strauss, Foster felt others’ suffering very acutely, a trait that Strauss believes was the basis of Foster’s attraction to psychology.

“She had an unusual resonance to other people’s pain,” Strauss said. “She was always deeply puzzled by why people would be mean to each other. It really, really troubled her.”

Strauss pointed out that the recent sexual assault on campus deeply wounded Foster.

“She was right-minded, and Macalester was the right place for that,” Hamre said. “She really had a lifelong goal of helping people, especially battered women. Whether she had the skills, or the right kind of personality for that is debatable.”

Indeed, despite her ability to empathize, Foster struggled with social interactions and made few friends among the younger element of the Macalester community.

“Jeanette was someone that you know, but don’t really know,” said Megan Van Dyke, who worked with Jeanette in the Macalester Association of Alternative Spiritualities. “She had people she considered friends, but had trouble connecting.”

Many students found Foster to be very intense, even antagonistic at times. Strauss feels that these students weren’t sure how to handle Foster’s intensity.

“Jeanette wasn’t someone who took anything lightly,” Strauss said.

According to Strauss, one of the few people in the community with whom Foster shared a strong connection, Foster “struggled socially at Macalester and I think a lot of people didn’t get the chance to know her very well. She felt that very acutely.”

“She would talk quite candidly about her efforts to be able to be herself in her relationships, but also to try to find a way to connect with other people and not to alarm them,” Strauss said.

One of her main social difficulties was rooted in her question-asking behavior in class.

“She was questioning and always kind of a beat behind [in class],” Hamre said.

“Jeanette was the kind of person who always wanted to really know,” explained Strauss. “She was very sincere in wanting answers and some [of her classmates] struggled with that because I don’t think we’ve got too many disciplines on campus where we’ve got a lot of answers… We’ve got a lot of questions here, but not a lot of answers.”

Strauss adds that Foster was, at times, able to laugh at her difficulties in social situations.

“She was very aware, with almost a wry sense of humor, about the ways in which she rubbed people the wrong way or scared them.”

Foster’s otherwise dormant light side was also evident in her slightly awkward, nearly omnipresent smile. Her grin was so ubiquitous that it became somewhat of a personal trademark and made her recognizable to the large segment of the student population outside her activity circles.

“In her writing she was very much like a normal Macalester student, she just couldn’t get it out,” Hamre said, who read some of the notebooks Foster left in her room. “She just didn’t have the kind of people skills that most folk at Mac have. Certainly she felt a good deal of frustration about that… I think that’ll surprise people.”

Although Foster’s suicide appeared planned, Foster left few clues for the handful of people on campus who knew her well.

According to Strauss, “the thought of hurting herself was not a new thought to [Foster],” but Foster appeared to doing better in the last year. “She took active steps to help herself with her troubles,” Strauss said.

“At other points in Jeannette’s time at Mac she has come to me with concerns [about hurting herself] and we followed those in different directions,” added Straus. “There was no hint this time…”

Further guising any suicidal plans she may have had, Foster even went about planning her post-college life. Six days prior to her death, Foster interviewed for a job at a group home for people suffering from serious and persistent mental illnesses like schizophrenia and manic depression. She hoped to work at the home for several years and then go to graduate school in a yet undecided sub discipline of Psychology.

“In our last conversation, she was really pointing ahead,” Strauss said. We talked about housing. We talked about jobs. We talked about how to handle certain relationships in the future.”

“She seemed to be doing some good planning and had a good sense of where her strengths lie [as well as] where she needed to do some further development.”

“She had been looking to the future. I don’t think she gave any hints,” concurred Hamre.

“The main thing this reminds us of is that when people are thinking about death, we need to take it extremely seriously,” Strauss said. “I don’t have any messianic beliefs that I could have stopped it or other people could have stopped it, but I sure would have like to have tried.”

“If you’re thinking about suicide, what Jeanette would have wanted, what the whole college wants, is for people to know that there are solutions,” Strauss said. “Talk to someone about it. Take it seriously if a friend brings it up to you.”

According to Strauss, the vast majority of people who attempt suicide, survive, and receive treatment end up regretting their decision to attempt suicide.

The college has a plethora of resources for those dealing with thoughts of suicide and students who are worried about a potentially suicidal friend. Winton Health Services and the Chapel are good places to start looking.