Harvard Finds No Student Organizations Responsible for Hazing in 2025-26

No Harvard College student organizations were found responsible for hazing during the 2025-26 academic year, according to a hazing transparency report released by the Harvard University Police Department last week.

The clean slate follows a year in which the College investigated at least two student groups over alleged hazing and reported a rise in the number of hazing complaints it received.

Assistant Dean of Student Engagement and Leadership Andrew “Andy” Donahue told students at a January hazing prevention training that the College had seen an increase in reports of potential hazing since Congress passed the Stop Campus Hazing Act — the federal law requiring universities to publish biannual reports of hazing findings — in December 2024. He attributed the increase to greater student awareness and new trainings, rather than a rise in misconduct.

The most prominent of last year’s cases involved the Harvard Radcliffe Orchestra, which the College suspended midway through the fall 2025 semester after the Dean of Students Office found it had engaged in hazing at its annual retreat, where upperclassmen blindfolded new members, shouted orders at them, and provided them with vodka.

The DSO reversed the hazing finding nearly two months later, after a group of orchestra members appealed. But the sanctions remained: the orchestra stayed suspended through December and was placed on probation for the spring semester, based on a separate determination that the group had “held social events without properly registering and providing alcohol to minors.”

The Crimson Key Society, which leads orientation events and campus tours, was also investigated in fall 2025 after proctors reported an interaction with costumed members during a scavenger hunt in Harvard Yard. The group was never found responsible.

Last week’s report is Harvard’s second under the federal law. The first, released in January, named the Harvard Independent as the only group found responsible for hazing during the 2024-25 academic year, following an April 2025 incident in which the group lined up new members, threw eggs at them, and covered them in honey, according to the report. The College issued the Independent a warning.

The reports are one of several changes Harvard has made over the past two years to comply with the federal law. The University also launched a hazing prevention website in June 2025 with educational resources and an anonymous reporting form, and now requires anti-hazing training for the leaders of its more than 450 student organizations.

“Harvard College continues to take serious its federal obligations under the Stop Campus Hazing Act, including ongoing education for student leaders, incoming students and campus staff and faculty, as well as required transparency reports,” Associate Dean of Students Jason Meier wrote in a Wednesday statement.

The College also adopted its first undergraduate-specific hazing policy in the 2026-27 student handbook, offering guidance on conduct the College considers hazing — including acts already barred under Massachusetts law, such as those risking physical or psychological injury — and appearing to indirectly reference practices historically used by some Harvard College organizations during initiation.

—Staff writer Sebastian B. Connolly can be reached at [email protected] or on Signal at sbc.23. Follow him on X @SebastianC4784.

—Staff writer Summer E. Rose can be reached at [email protected] or on Signal at ser.85. Follow her on X @summerellenrose.