Illustration by Marien Donohoe | The Wright State Guardian
Emily Mancuso contributed to this story.
Over 200 hazing deaths have been reported in the United States since 1838, five deaths occurring in 2019 alone. In Ohio, Collin’s Law seeks to prevent this.
In 2019, the year after Collin Wiant died from hazing practices, five more deaths were attributed to hazing. In January, Noah Domingo died from alcohol poisoning at the University of California Irvine. In April, Sebastian Serafin-Bazan died of cardiac arrest resulting from forced exercise. In October, Antonio Tsialas died from trauma sustained from falling into a gorge after leaving a fraternity party with alcohol in his system. Dylan Hernandez’s death quickly followed on Nov. 10, resulting from a head injury.
Spurred by Wiant’s death, the law makes hazing a felony and failure to report it a misdemeanor. Last spring semester, Wright State was among 17 Ohio universities and colleges advocating for Collin’s Law through a letter-writing campaign.
The campaign consisted of reaching out to representatives and personal efforts to inform and encourage Ohio Greek life to support the law.
Led by Ohio University, the campaign kicked off on March 29 with a Zoom program. It featured Ohio Sens. Stephanie Kunze and Theresa Gavarone as well as Kathleen Wiant, mother of Collin Wiant, who the law was named after.
Collin’s law was passed and went into effect on Oct. 7.
Wiant led the discussion by sharing her son’s story, an emotional and transformative one.
She shared how her son—a freshman at Ohio University—Collin Wiant, lost his life by inhaling a deadly amount of nitrous oxide. This is known as “Whippits,” slang for using nitrous oxide as a recreational inhalant drug.
The young 18 year old passed away early the next day, which could have been easily prevented.
Following his death, Wiant’s parents decided to make a change to help prevent hazing.
“They wanted to see what could be done in Ohio to change what was a lousy law into something with some teeth that might actually have some prevention to it,” Gina Keucher, fraternity and sorority life program director at Wright State, said.
Keucher, Interfraternity Council president Connor Algren and College Panhellenic Council president Brittany Zazuetta all attended the Zoom program.
Wright State students helped create a sample letter to send to their state senators and representatives, encouraging them to vote in favor of Collin’s Law. Various students shared this on their social media.
The letter-writing campaign gave students a voice, a way to bring change to not only their campuses, but to Ohio.
For Zazuetta, being heard was important.
“We were able to speak at [the conference] and give our viewpoints. That was really important because it lets us know that it’s not just them frowning upon us but giving students the voice to say yes—this is something we need on our campuses,” Zazueta said.
Algren made his voice heard by participating in the letter-writing campaign. Algren took what he learned at the Zoom program and reached out to Ohio’s senators and representatives.
Many responded and Algren was able to have an in-depth conversation with his senators and representatives.
Algren spoke with WDTN, a Dayton-based news station, about Collin’s Law in addition to the letter-writing campaign. He emphasized how hazing goes against Wright State’s values and how joining a fraternity or sorority is joining a brotherhood or sisterhood.
For Algren, hazing is the opposite of what Greek life is supposed to be and why he advocated so much for Collin’s Law.
“Nobody hazes intending to kill another person. But, you know, the reality is that sometimes that happens when you are hazing someone, and it’s preventable. So those are some of the big reasons that I want to advocate for the law,” Algren said.
The law also emphasized prevention through education, something Keucher, Algren and Zazuetta find essential. For WSU, pushing for Collin’s Law was more than advocating for a law punishing hazing; it advocated for student safety and hazing prevention.
Now that the law is in effect, Wright State’s advocacy for student safety takes the form of hazing prevention education.
“I think that the education piece of the law especially is important. Education is the most powerful tool you have at combating a lot of those types of issues. More so than punishment, right? We’d rather stop the problem before it happens than have a problem,” Algren said.
According to Keucher, education was implemented as of January 2022, as required by Collin’s Law. One of such educational programs is the monthly Fraternity and Sorority Brown Bag Chat, where fraternities and sororities are invited to attend to learn more about proper leadership procedures and how to prevent hazing.
Keucher says there is difficulty in getting people to be as invested in hazing education because there are relatively few hazing incidents, with only two confirmed incidents of hazing on WSU’s campus within the past five years.
Keucher believes it is important to continuously advocate for Wright State’s campus to be educated and follow Collin’s Law and student safety.
“When we train about hazing, it won’t just be the law because the law is a very specific, huge harm. For us, it is about respect. It is about the expectation that members of the Wright State community are treated with respect and care,” Keucher said. “Hazing for us and for our policy is a little bit more expansive than what would be criminal hazing.”
Collin’s law and the educational programs to follow will help prevent hazing on campus and educate students on correct practices in their student organizations.
Now, thanks to Collin’s Law, making hazing education and prevention a priority becomes just a little bit easier.
