As the parent of a new college student, your to-do list this month is already a mile long as you help your student through this major transition.
But let’s add one more thing to your list: Make sure your back-to-school checklist includes having a conversation about college hazing. That simple act could save your child’s life.
Don’t assume your student won’t experience hazing because of their personality or the types of groups they join. Hazing can and does happen to all kinds of students. Some 55% of students experience hazing — but only 9% identify what they experience as hazing, according to our partners at the research organization StopHazing.org.
For students involved in fraternities, sororities, or varsity athletics, nearly 75% experience hazing.
Hazing happens in marching bands and honor societies, club sports and theater groups, lacrosse teams and student military organizations.
Understand that hazing happens across a spectrum of behaviors, from intimidation (e.g., social isolation or the use of demeaning names) to harassment (verbal abuse or sleep deprivation) to violence (forced alcohol consumption or abduction).
Learn more about the Spectrum of Hazing from StopHazing.org.
Use our “Campus Lookup” feature to search for the college name and see their report of recent hazing incidents, their hazing policy, and the reporting form and a school contact for reporting hazing or learning more about campus efforts to prevent it.
Our website contains hazing incident data from Georgia, Louisiana, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, and Washington.
Even if there’s no data available, that still tells you something about whether the institution is taking the issue of hazing seriously.
Regardless of where the college is located, take a look at the college’s website. If you do a search for “hazing,” what do you find? Are there hazing prevention resources highlighted? Is there an easy way to report hazing? Or is the institution silent on the issue?
StopHazing also offers a number of resources on hazing prevention.
You’ve probably already had conversations with your student about alcohol, drugs, and personal safety on campus now that they are leaving home. Make time to talk to them about hazing, too.
Students should know that it’s natural to want to belong to a group, to find their “people” in a new environment. As they seek to join a team, fraternity, or club, students may not recognize what’s happening to them as hazing.
Hazing often starts small — maybe it’s an expectation to buy a group member food or run errands for them. From there, it can grow until students are in so deep they can’t see a way out.
Have a plan in place for if they experience — or witness — hazing or group activities that make them uncomfortable. How can they recognize their own instincts about a risky situation? Will they promise to confide in you? Who else could they report it to?
This helpful blog post from psychologist/coach Lisa Stephen offers additional tips for talking with your teen.
The weeks between the beginning of school and Thanksgiving break are when new college students are uniquely vulnerable. Away from home for the first time, they face new personal and social pressures and may feel compelled to take risks to “fit in.”
Campus safety organizations refer to this time period as the “red zone,”when campus sexual assaults skyrocket. Research shows that hazing overlaps with concerns like sexual violence, mental health, and high-risk substance use on campus.
In the Greek system, fraternity and sorority events like Bid Night, Big Brother Night, and Initiation, often held in the fall, have led to numerous injuries and deaths of new pledges.
Talk about hazing with your student. Give them the context and the resources to identify and confront it when they see or experience hazing.
And watch for signs that your student may be experiencing hazing, including:
This article from the University of Virginia’s Gordie Center, which works to end hazing and substance misuse among students, provides helpful information on identifying hazing and how to intervene.
It’s important to talk about hazing in your family and to make a plan with your teen.
But to end hazing for good, it’s past time for the institutions that permit and perpetuate toxic hazing culture to step up.
The truth is that hazing is enabled by colleges and universities that profit from hosting student organizations on their campuses – including those with known track records of bad behavior. College alumni – including those involved with athletic teams, fraternities, and sororities – are among the most loyal donors to their institutions.
The last thing that universities spending millions of dollars on branding and marketing want to acknowledge is that hazing is happening on their campuses and in student organizations that drive donations.
There is also a financial incentive for national Greek organizations and their local chapters, as well as boosters of athletic teams and student groups, to look the other way when whispers about hazing arise. Student fees, chapter or club fees, and donations provide a steady revenue stream for many of these groups.
Parents and students need to know that a campus’s “zero tolerance” policy on hazing may not mean much in reality.
While some universities and organizations go above and beyond to provide resources, training, and information to end campus hazing, too many others are talking up policies that are nothing more than window dressing.
Still others aren’t talking about hazing at all.
Colleges, universities, and national student organizations must call out the bad actors among their student groups and prevent them from recruiting new members whose health and safety may be at risk.