SCHA Compliance: Are Your Hazing Policies Ready?

Flexibility in Hazing Definitions

Stop Campus Hazing ActThe Stop Campus Hazing Act (SCHA), enacted on December 23, 2024, is designed to create a multi-faceted hazing prevention framework for colleges and universities that doesn’t rely upon a single approach. This includes allowing varying definitions of hazing for different aspects of compliance:

  • Clery Act Statistics: Hazing as defined by the SCHA.
  • Institutional Policy: Hazing as defined by the institution.

Congress balanced national hazing data needs with institutional flexibility, allowing policies to use the SCHA definition, state law, or an institution’s own definition. Collection of statistics began on January 1, 2025 and policy requirements will continue to roll out in 2025 and beyond.

Standards of Conduct

Each college or university must establish no later than July 1, 2025, if they haven’t already, “standards of conduct relating to hazing, as defined by the institution”. (Emphasis added) They must then, beginning no later than December 23, 2025, post a list of every student organization “found to be in violation” of those standards to their website.

Preventing, Reporting, and Investigating

Institutions must also develop “policies relating to hazing (as defined by the institution)” that address:

  • “research-informed… prevention and awareness programs related to hazing”; and
  • “how to report incidents of such hazing, and the process used to investigate such incidents”.

SAFE Campuses, LLC understands the SCHA to require that institutions have these policies in place for and be summarized in the Clery Act Annual Security Report due by October 1, 2026. We have, however, requested clarification about this deadline from the U.S. Department of Education. As these policies will be published alongside statistics using the national definition, we recommend a clear statement explaining the differences, if any, in the definitions to help avoid confusion among campus community members.

This blog does not provide legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship. If you need legal advice, please contact an attorney directly.

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