The Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District defines hazing in Administrative Procedure 3436 as “Any intentional, knowing, or reckless act committed by a person against another person regardless of the willingness of such other person to participate, in connection with initiation, affiliation, or continued membership in a student organization, that creates a risk of or causes physical or psychological injury beyond the reasonable risks of normal participation in the District or organization.

Hazing may include, but is not limited to: whipping, beating, striking, electronic shocking; sleep deprivation, exposure to extreme elements, or excessive physical exertion; forced consumption of alcohol, drugs, or other harmful substances; coerced sexual acts; activities that induce fear of bodily harm or violate local, state, tribal, or federal laws.

A Student organization at the District is one wherein two or more of the members are students enrolled at the District regardless of whether the organization is established or recognized by the District. A student organization may include a student club, society, association, athletic team, club sports team, fraternity, sorority, band, or student government.

Prohibited Conduct

The District prohibits students, student organizations, and employees from engaging in, encouraging, or facilitating hazing. The District strictly prohibits retaliation against individuals who report hazing.

Common Questions Around Hazing

Who commits hazing on California campuses?

Hazing is commonly portrayed in movies as an activity of Greek fraternities and sororities. Hazing also occurs in intercollegiate athletics, sports clubs, religious clubs, marching bands, professional clubs, multicultural organizations, and other types of groups.

A common defense is that rogue members committed the hazing activity, unsanctioned by the organization. However, organizations have lost their campus status for hazing activities performed by members outside the leadership circle. Organization leaders are ultimately responsible for communicating ground rules for new member activities and for monitoring.

Why does hazing persist on college campuses?

Organizations are sometimes unaware that their initiation activities are actually hazing. Initiates may be hesitant to question such activities, which are often handed down by older members. The group may offset concerns about possible harm with the belief that they are fostering loyalty and bonding. No matter what group members believe, no one should ever be subjected to hazing.

How can an organization determine if its activities count as hazing?

To determine if activities are possibly harmful, organizations should consider how acceptable they would be from the perspective of the broader community. The "publicity test" asks the following questions:

• Would you let the campus newspaper or a local TV station cover your initiation activities?
• Would you be comfortable describing your activities to your parents, a professor, psychologist, or university chancellor?

If the answer to these questions is "No," your activities are most likely hazing. When in doubt, check with your organization's advisor or coach.

What if I agreed to participate?

Organizations charged with hazing may argue that an activity wasn't hazing because new members agreed to participate (perhaps due to peer pressure and a desire to fit in). But even if new members agreed to participate, the activity is still defined as hazing.

 

Examples of Hazing

Intimidation Hazing

Behaviors that emphasize a power imbalance between new members / rookies and other members of the group or team are termed “intimidation hazing” because these types of hazing are often taken for granted or accepted as “harmless” or meaningless.

Intimidation hazing typically involves activities or attitudes that breach reasonable standards of mutual respect and place new members / rookies on the receiving end of ridicule, embarrassment, and/or humiliation tactics. New members / rookies often feel the need to endure intimidation hazing to feel like part of the group or team. (Some types of intimidation hazing may also be considered harassment hazing).

Some examples include but are not limited to:

• Silence periods with implied threats for violation
• Deprivation of privileges granted to other members including name calling
• Tasks of personal servitude
• Requiring new members / rookies to perform duties not assigned to other members
• Socially isolating new members / rookies
• Line-ups and drills / tests on meaningless information/ Memorization of information not explicitly required by the national new member process
• Requiring new members / rookies to refer to other members with titles (e.g. “Mr.,” “Miss”) while they are identified with demeaning terms
• Expecting certain items to always be in one's possession (including requiring the carrying of objects, such as bricks, buckets, or large objects)

Harassment Hazing

Behaviors that cause emotional anguish or physical discomfort in order to feel like part of the group. Harassment hazing confuses, frustrates, and causes undue stress for new members / rookies. (Some types of harassment hazing can also be considered violent hazing.)

Some examples include but are not limited to:

• Verbal abuse/Threats or implied threats.
• Wearing publicly, apparel which is conspicuous and not normally in good taste, or requiring shaved hair/Asking new members to wear embarrassing or humiliating attire.
• Stunt or skit nights with degrading, crude, or humiliating acts/Participating in personally degrading or humiliating games or activities.
• Expecting new members / rookies to perform personal service to other members such as errands, cooking, cleaning etc.
• Creation of extensive fatigue or forced or coerced participation in calisthenics, push-ups, sit-ups, running, and other fatiguing activities.
• Required (explicit or implicit) participation in quests, treasure hunts, scavenger hunts, road trips, or any such activities.
• Sleep deprivation/Late work sessions or activities that interfere with scholastic activities, including exhausting and time consuming projects that are too disruptive to normal study patterns.
• Intentionally creating clean-up work.
• Expecting new members / rookies to be deprived of maintaining a normal schedule of bodily cleanliness.
• Be expected to harass others.
• Any activity considered morally offensive by an individual participating.
• Any activity without constructive aspect or reasonable purpose, including but not limited to "line-ups," "rat courts," mock trials, interrogations, yelling of obscenities, or votes of continuance not consistent with the national constitution of, or sanctioned by the national fraternity or sorority.

Violent Hazing

Behaviors that have the potential to cause physical and/or emotional, or psychological harm.

Some examples include but are not limited to:

• Forced or coerced alcohol or other drug consumption.
• Forced, required, or coerced consumption of any food, liquid, vile substances or concoctions.
• Physical abuse including paddling, beating, pushing, hitting, physical threats, exposure to the elements, or other physical harm, or forms of assault.
• Branding, burning, and tattooing.
• Water intoxication.
• Expecting abuse or mistreatment of animals.
• Public nudity/sexual simulations/bondage.
• Confining participants to rooms or areas that are uncomfortable due to temperature, noise, size, or air quality for the purpose of harassment.
• Any dangerous activity including, but not limited to long swims, jumps from high places, binding, and blindfolding.
• Member kidnaps, ditches, abductions.
• Exposure to cold weather or extreme heat without appropriate protection.
• Expecting illegal activity.
• Any other activity which is not consistent with the fraternal law, ritual, or policy and/ or Board Policies.

Hazing is a violation of both College Policy and California law, whether the alleged activities occurred on campus or off campus. Student organizations and/or individual students accepting responsibility or found responsible for hazing may be suspended or dismissed from the Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District in addition to facing potential criminal sanctions, such as prison incarceration and monetary fines. Student organizations, sports clubs, and athletic teams involved in alleged hazing activities may lose their status as campus organizations.

The Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District has adopted Administrative Procedure 3436 Hazing, which is reflected below:

AP 3436 Hazing

References: 20 U.S. Code Section 1092;

Education Code Section 66305 et seq.; and

Penal Code Section 245.6

Date Issued: July 6, 2026

The District is committed to providing an academic environment free of hazing. This procedure defines hazing and sets forth a procedure for the reporting, investigation, and resolution of complaints of hazing. This procedure protects current, former, or prospective students.

Definitions

Hazing – Any intentional, knowing, or reckless act committed by a person against another person regardless of the willingness of such other person to participate, in connection with initiation, affiliation, or continued membership in a student organization, that creates a risk of or causes physical or psychological injury beyond the reasonable risks of normal participation in the District or organization.

Hazing may include, but is not limited to: whipping, beating, striking, electronic shocking; sleep deprivation, exposure to extreme elements, or excessive physical exertion; forced consumption of alcohol, drugs, or other harmful substances; coerced sexual acts; activities that induce fear of bodily harm or violate local, state, tribal, or federal laws.

Student organization – An organization at the District in which two or more of the members are students enrolled at the District regardless of whether the organization is established or recognized by the District. A student organization may include a student club, society, association, athletic team, club sports team, fraternity, sorority, band, or student government.

Prohibited Conduct

The District prohibits students, student organizations, and employees from engaging in, encouraging, or facilitating hazing. The District strictly prohibits retaliation against individuals who report hazing.

Reporting Hazing

Individuals may report hazing using the following methods:

Immediate Danger: Call 911

Anonymous Reports: Individuals may report hazing anonymously by texting or calling (844) 619-0004.

Confidential Reports: Individuals may also report hazing via a confidential reporting method in which the reporter provides their identity. Confidential complaints can be submitted using the following link: Complaint Form

The District will investigate reports of hazing promptly and with confidentiality protected to the extent permitted by law.

Investigation and Disciplinary Process

The Dean of Student Engagement and Belonging Office for each Campus will investigate reports of hazing.

Violation of the District’s prohibition on hazing will result in appropriate disciplinary action up to and including termination of employment or expulsion. Student organizations recognized by the District that permit hazing may face suspension, revocation of recognition, or other disciplinary actions.

Disciplinary action may include referral for criminal prosecution.

Annual Reporting and Transparency

The District shall collect and report statistics on hazing incidents in its annual security reports. (See AP 3515 Reporting of Crimes)

The District shall publish an annual Campus Hazing Transparency Report on its website. The Campus Hazing Transparency Report will summarize hazing incidents and identify the student organization found responsible for hazing. The District will update this report at least twice per year and maintain the Campus Hazing Transparency Report for five years.

Prevention and Education

The District will provide a comprehensive prevention and outreach program addressing hazing for students and employees. The comprehensive prevention program shall include components on identifying hazing, hazing prevention, and bystander intervention strategies. The District’s outreach program shall inform students of the District’s policy on the prohibition of hazing and include a process for contacting and informing the student body, athletic programs, and affiliated student organizations about the District’s prohibition on hazing.

The District requires all students involved in student organizations, clubs, or athletic teams to complete hazing prevention training annually. Additionally, all employees who advise or oversee student groups must also complete hazing prevention training.

California Education Code – Sections 66305-66309

This bill expressly prohibits a person from being subjected to hazing in any program or activity conducted by an educational institution that receives, or benefits from, state financial assistance or enrolls students who receive state student financial aid. The bill defines an educational institution as a public or private institution of higher education in the state.

Beginning January 1, 2026, this bill additionally authorizes a former, current, or prospective student, against whom hazing is directed and who has suffered injury as a result, to commence a civil action against an educational institution if (1) the institution has direct involvement in the hazing practice of the organization, or knew or should have known of the hazing practice and failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the hazing practice, (2) the organization involved in the hazing is affiliated with the educational institution at the time of the alleged hazing incident, and (3) the alleged hazing incident occurred on or after January 1, 2026.

For purposes of determining whether an educational institution “knew or should have known of the hazing practice and failed to take reasonable steps to prevent the hazing practice of the organization,” the bill would establish a rebuttable presumption that an educational institution took reasonable steps to address hazing if the educational institution has specified antihazing measures.

The bill requires the Trustees of the California State University, the Regents of the University of California, the California Community Colleges and certain independent institutions of higher education, on or before June 30, 2026, and annually thereafter, to report to the appropriate policy committees of the Legislature the number of hazing incidents that constituted a violation of the institution’s policy prohibiting hazing and whether the violation was affiliated with a student organization, as specified.

This bill also requires the State Department of Education to make available on the department’s internet website, on or before July 1, 2025, a model antihazing policy for local educational agencies and resources on hazing prevention for professional development purposes and

Hazing is classified as an Assault and Battery:

Assault and Battery

California Penal Code - Section 245.6

(a) It shall be unlawful to engage in hazing, as defined in this section.

(b) “Hazing” means any method of initiation or preinitiation into a student organization or student body, whether or not the organization or body is officially recognized by an educational institution, which is likely to cause serious bodily injury to any former, current, or prospective student of any school, community college, college, university, or other educational institution in this state. The term “hazing” does not include customary athletic events or school-sanctioned events.

(c) A violation of this section that does not result in serious bodily injury is a misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of not less than one hundred dollars ($100), nor more than five thousand dollars ($5,000), or imprisonment in the county jail for not more than one year, or both.

(d) Any person who personally engages in hazing that results in death or serious bodily injury as defined in paragraph (4) of subdivision (f) of Section 243 of the Penal Code, is guilty of either a misdemeanor or a felony, and shall be punished by imprisonment in county jail not exceeding one year, or by imprisonment pursuant to subdivision (h) of Section 1170.

(e) The person against whom the hazing is directed may commence a civil action for injury or damages. The action may be brought against any participants in the hazing, or any organization to which the student is seeking membership whose agents, directors, trustees, managers, or officers authorized, requested, commanded, participated in, or ratified the hazing.

(f) Prosecution under this section shall not prohibit prosecution under any other provision of law.

(Amended by Stats. 2011, Ch. 15, Sec. 299. (AB 109) Effective April 4, 2011. Operative October 1, 2011, by Sec. 636 of Ch. 15, as amended by Stats. 2011, Ch. 39, Sec. 68.)

This is also known as Matt's Law. Matt's Law was named in memory of Matt Carrington, a 21-year-old California State University, Chico student from Concord, California. Carrington died in the basement of a fraternity house located two short blocks from campus.

Prior to the enactment of Matt's Law, hazing — even in the case of death — was only a misdemeanor, as part of California's education code, rather than punishable under the state's penal code. Matt's law prevents unaffiliated fraternities from using the argument that they cannot be punished for hazing, simply because they are not student organizations. The law also gives prosecutors clear authority to bring charges against anyone or any organization involved in hazing, not just currently enrolled students.

H.R.5646 - Stop Campus Hazing Act

PDF version available here.

This act requires institutions of higher education (IHEs) that participate in federal student aid programs to report hazing incidents. It also renames the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act as the Jeanne Clery Campus Safety Act. In compliance with the Clery Act, the Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District published the Annual Security Report

Specifically, the act requires each IHE to disclose hazing incidents that were reported to campus security authorities or local police agencies in its annual security report. The act defines the term hazing to mean any intentional, knowing, or reckless act committed by a person (whether individually or in concert with other persons) against another person or persons regardless of the willingness of such other person or persons to participate, that (1) is committed in the course of an initiation into, an affiliation with, or the maintenance of membership in, a student organization (e.g., a club, athletic team, fraternity, or sorority); and (2) causes or creates a risk, above the reasonable risk encountered in the course of participation in the IHE or the organization, of physical or psychological injury.

Additionally, each IHE must include in its annual security report (1) a statement of current policies relating to hazing, how to report hazing incidents, the process used to investigate hazing incidents, and information on applicable laws on hazing; and (2) a statement of policy regarding prevention and awareness programs relating to hazing that includes a description of prevention programs.

Further, an IHE must develop a campus hazing transparency report that summarizes findings concerning any student organization found to be in violation of the IHE's standards of conduct relating to hazing. An IHE is not required to develop or update this report unless the IHE has a finding of a hazing violation.

The act does not apply to foreign IHEs.

Thank you for reporting suspected hazing. No student should ever face belittlement, humiliation, or exposure to potentially harmful situations in the pursuit of inclusion in a group at Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District.

If you are a new member of an organization, stay connected with friends outside of the group. If you suspect an activity may be hazing, talk to friends and family members about what you are experiencing and seek their advice. Refuse to participate in an activity if you suspect it's hazing, or quit the organization. Report any suspected hazing to campus officials via the Complaint Form.

Any member of the campus, whether affiliated with the offending organization or not, has a responsibility to report hazing. Click below to find the various methods of reporting possible incidents of hazing. The university takes allegations of hazing seriously. Reports can be anonymous in nature through our online reporting module.

Reporting Hazing

Individuals may report hazing using the following methods:

Immediate Danger: Call 911

Anonymous Reports: Individuals may report hazing anonymously by texting or calling (844) 619-0004.

Confidential Reports: Individuals may also report hazing via a confidential reporting method in which the reporter provides their identity. Confidential complaints can be submitted using the following link: Complaint Form

The District will investigate reports of hazing promptly and with confidentiality protected to the extent permitted by law.