MANDATORY NOTICE ON HAZING

Chapter 4 of the Texas Education Code, Subchapter B provides criminal penalties for persons and/ or organizations engaging in acts of hazing. Despite rising national concern, recent years have continued to witness the injury and death of students from such incidents. To assure your awareness of the law, the following excerpts are displayed for your information.

HAZING: hazing is prohibited in state education institutions by the Texas Education Code. Students of Lamar University-Beaumont are forbidden to engage in or to encourage, aid, or assist any person(s) participating in what is commonly known and recognized as hazing. Excerpts from the Code are reprinted here.

A. Definition: Hazing means any intentional, knowing or reckless act, occurring on or off the campus of an educational institution, by one person alone or acting with others directed against a student that endangers the mental or physical health or safety of a student for the purpose of pledging, being initiated into, affiliating with, holding office in, or maintaining membership in any organization whose members are or include students at an educational institution. The term includes but is not limited to:

• Any type of physical brutality, such as whipping, beating, striking, branding, electronic shocking, placing of harmful substance on the body, or similar activity;
• Any typoe of physical activity, such as sleep deprivation, exposure to the elements, confinement in a small place, calisthenics, or other activity that subjects the student to an unreasonable risk of harm or that adversely affects the mental or physical health or safety of the student;
• Any activity involving consumption of a food, liquid, alcoholic beverage, liquor, drug, or other substance which subjects the student to an unreasonable risk of harm or which adversely affects the mental or physical health or safety of the student;
• Any activity that intimidates or threatens the student with ostracism, that subjects the student to extreme mental stress, shame, or humiliation, or that adversley affects the mental health or dignity of the student or discourages the student from entering or remaining registered in an educational institution, or that may reasonably be expected to cause a student to leave the organization or the institution rather than submit to acts described in this sub-section;
• Any activity that induces, causes or requires the student to perform a duty or task which involves a violation of the Penal Code.

B.PERSONAL HAZING OFFENSE: A person commits an offense if the person:

• Engages in hazing;
• Solicits, encourages, directs,aids or attempts to aid another in engaging in hazing;
• Intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly permits hazing to occur; or
• Has firsthand knowledge of the planning of a specific hazing incident involving a student in an educational institution, or firsthand knowledge that a specific hazing incident has occurred, and knowingly fails to report said knowledge in writing to the dean of students or other appropriate official of the institution.

C.ORGANIZATION HAZING OFFENSE: An organization commits an offense if the organization condones or encourages hazing or if an officer or any combination of members, pledges, or alumni of the organization commits or assits in the commission of hazing.

D. CONSENT NOT A DEFENSE: It is NOT a defense to prosecution of an offense that the person against whom the hazing was directed consented to or acquiesced in the hazing activity.

E. IMMUNITY FROM PROSECUTION: In the prosecution of an offense, the court may grant immunity from prosecution for the offense to each person who is subpoenaed to testify for the prosecution and who does testify for the prosecution. Any person reporting a specific hazing incident involving a student in an educational institution to the dean of students or other appropriate official of the institution is immune from liability, civil or criminal, that might otherwise be incurred or imposed as a result of the report. Immunity extends to participation in any judicial proceeding resullting from the report. A person reporting in bad faith with malice is not protected by this section.

F. LEGAL CONSIDERATIONS: Any offense may be punishable by fines, confinement in county jail or both, depending upon the severity of the offense.