Joe Biden Signs Law Requiring Colleges to Report Hazing Incidents
“The requirements could kick in as soon as next week and affect many campus groups.”
It’s kind of surprising that hazing is even still a thing but as we have seen in recent years, the practice still exists.
USA Today reports:
Biden signs law mandating colleges report hazing incidents
President Joe Biden on Tuesday enacted the first federal anti-hazing law, marking the end of a yearslong push by victims’ families for more transparency and accountability on college campuses.
The Stop Campus Hazing Act, which passed the House of Representatives in September and the Senate this month, requires universities to start collecting hazing statistics to include in regular public reports.
The requirements could kick in as soon as next week and affect many campus groups.
Under long-standing federal statutes, colleges and universities must disclose crimes that occur on their campuses each year. Yet despite the sometimes violent and fatal nature of hazing, schools have never been required by the federal government to disclose statistics about how often it happens, especially within fraternities and sororities that target their new members.
Though nearly every state has an anti-hazing law, the measures vary in scope and impact, according to the advocacy group StopHazing. Earlier attempts to put a federal law on the books have fizzled in Congress.
With Biden’s enactment of the law Tuesday, many colleges will have to reconcile their existing protocols with the new federal requirements. The law also pushes schools to implement comprehensive hazing prevention programs and identify which student groups are found in violation of anti-hazing rules.
Julie and Gary DeVercelly Sr., whose son died in a fraternity hazing incident at Rider University in New Jersey in 2007, commended Biden on Tuesday.
DONATE
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
