As college students move back to campus, legislators and advocates want to make sure accidents causing serious injury or death are reported.
Under the 1990 Clery Act, colleges and universities that participate in federal financial aid programs are required to timely report on-campus crime.
But according to U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), accidents are the leading cause of death on college campuses, and they don’t have to be reported in the same way.
He wants to amend the Clery Act to change that.
“Reporting and tracking gives colleges a powerful incentive to do better to make their streets and dorms safer, and to stop any kind of negligence or recklessness,” Blumenthal said.
Blumenthal has introduced the COREY Act, named after Corey Hausman of Westport, who died in 2018 after falling off his skateboard at the University of Colorado.
Hausman was less than a month into his freshman year at the university at the time of the accident — but according to the dean of students, there had already been two student deaths that semester.
Corey’s dad, Joel Hausman, and his late wife Nanette, wanted to research how often students die in on-campus accidents. But according to Hausman, they could not find any information.
“Right now there's a data desert, there are no metrics,” Hausman said. “Sure, you might google it, and you'll read sensationalized articles on younger adults who have perished. But no statistics, nothing constructive that you could use to make things better.”
The COREY Act would require schools to report on-campus accidents that result in serious injury or dealt the same way that murder, rape and other crimes have to be reported under the Cleary Act.
The bill has bipartisan support and was introduced in the House by U.S Representatives Jim Himes (D-CT-04) and Joe Courtney (D-CT-02).
