The Arkansas Gazette quoted Ellen Gilchrist, an author, who told the 1985 Governor's School students:I ask you to start ignoring your parents. Be really nice to them, and forget them. At the age you are now, it's time to start using your stuff, your real stuff.8
Mark Lowery, the Clinton staff member who became disillusioned, said:
The instructors tear down the student's authority figure system and help establish another one-the student himself. They convince the students that "You are the elite. The reason why you are not going to be understood when you go home, not by your parents, your friends, your pastor or anybody is because you have been treated to thought that they can't handle." This intellectual and cultural elitism gives students the "right" to say, "We know better than you."
After two former students committed suicide, the Joint Interim Education Committee of the Arkansas legislature held limited hearings on September 15, 1994. Shelvie Cole, a trained school psychologist testified. Her son Brandon committed suicide after attending the Governor's School. She said she was appearing both as a professional and as a parent. She also made it plain that she was not a religious zealot or a conservative, adding that, "The reason I am saying this is because anytime anyone seems to have a negative comment toward the Governor's School, they are automatically categorized into one of those groups, somehow negating their comments."9 WORLD magazine said her car had a Clinton-Gore sticker.10 She said: I had no idea the impact that Governor's School had on Brandon until I read his log after his death. I knew that he had begun to change; but when I began reading his log, I understood some of the things that had gone on within Brandon that were the result of some of his experiences at Governor's School. I am not going to give you secondhand information. I am going to let Brandon talk for himself because I am going to read directly from his diary that he kept while he was in Governor's School.
She then read from his log words written at the school:
We have truly been plucked out of our world. We live in the Governor's School world. I don't think I will be able to leave after this is over. Let me warn you that I am changing inside. I hope you will like me as I am, but I am learning a new outlook on life and reality....! feel sorry for people who aren't here. The outside world is so blind toward world events.
His final entry in the log said:
Governor's School helped me to separate myself from most of the people around me. The absence of being who I was known for gave me a chance to look inside of my real self. After I came back from the [3-day July 4th] break, my friends and I could tell that we had suddenly been transformed into free thinkers.