Florida State wins first national award for hazing prevention

The Florida State University is the first recipient of a new national award given to a college or university for innovative, year-round hazing prevention programming that focuses on education and intervention.

The Zeta Tau Alpha Award for Innovation in Hazing Prevention and Education comes with a $10,000 award to support future hazing prevention efforts in the Florida State community. The award, presented by HazingPrevention.Org and funded by the Zeta Tau Alpha Fraternity for Women and the Zeta Tau Alpha Foundation Inc., will be given at the NASPA (Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education) Annual Conference that will be held March 6-10 in Chicago.

“We are grateful for the recognition this award brings to our efforts and for the additional resources it will bring to the community,” said Adam Goldstein, associate dean of students at Florida State University. Goldstein said he believes Florida State won the award because of the way the university responded to the 2005 passage of Florida’s hazing law, the Chad Meredith Act.

“Staff from around the campus came to the table and asked hard questions about how we were communicating about hazing and harm reduction with our students,” he said. “In the end, we decided there was a way we could do things better.”

In order to reach student organizations, sports clubs, athletes and fraternities and sororities, the Student Affairs division created the Web site http://hazing.fsu.edu as a central portal for hazing resources, information and reporting. The site includes an interactive quiz to test students’ knowledge about hazing laws in Florida as well as the university’s expectations of students. An anti-hazing pledge is posted at the site along with the names of dozens of students who have taken the pledge.

“I have been so impressed with the hazing prevention work at Florida State since I first saw an early draft of their Web site,” said Tracy Maxwell, executive director of HazingPrevention.Org. “Featuring students from various walks of student life, this site does so much to educate the community about hazing and make clear its stance that the practice is not acceptable.

“Most impressive, however, is the use of a comprehensive, year-round approach to hazing prevention and education, precisely what this award seeks to recognize and encourage. By involving so many constituencies and approaches in the planning and execution of their programming, they have ensured successful outcomes and will serve as a role model to other campuses as they approach this work.”

Mary Coburn, vice president for Student Affairs at Florida State, said she is pleased that the work of Goldstein and the staff in the Dean of Students Office has received national recognition.

“They have done a wonderful job involving the entire campus community in this effort, and they’ve made sure that the message of zero tolerance for hazing is distributed broadly to all campus groups,” Coburn said. “I am so pleased that their work has been recognized as a model program.”

The award money will be used to support hazing research and assessment efforts, fund undergraduate and graduate student attendance at national hazing trainings and symposiums and support greater awareness of existing prevention efforts in the Florida State community, Goldstein said.

HazingPrevention.Org is a non-profit 501(c)3 organization whose mission is to empower people to prevent hazing. The organization sponsors institutes, training programs and National Hazing Prevention Week — observed on campuses across the country the last week in September each year — and serve as a clearinghouse for resources on the topic of hazing.