In a case watched closely by universities across the country, a Middlesex Superior Court judge has ruled that the parents of an MIT student who committed suicide at the college can proceed with their lawsuit against college administrators and staff, a decision some higher education officials say is unusually expansive and alarming.

Judge Christine M. McEvoy ruled that the parents of Elizabeth Shin, who committed suicide in 2000, had grounds to continue with their $27 million lawsuit against Massachusetts Institute of Technology psychiatrists and two administrators who are not mental health professionals.

Nonclinicians are not usually considered responsible for preventing suicide, but McEvoy wrote that, in this case, Shin's housemaster and a student life dean had a ''special relationship" with her, requiring them to protect her, because they ''could reasonably foresee that Elizabeth would hurt herself without proper supervision."...