The Legal Side of Campus Threat Assessment and Management: What Student Counselors Need to Know

Abstract

This article identifies what student mental health professionals need to know about legal issues of relevance to threat assessment and management. The article summarizes the common law duties and the common law and statutory standards of care that are likely to apply to the work of college and university threat assessment and management teams. The article also addresses privacy law, disability law, policy, and documentation-related issues that often present challenges in the campus threat assessment and management context. In sum, the article strives to educate student counseling center professionals so that they can contribute effectively to the important work of threat assessment and management teams without being hindered by potential misconceptions about legal issues.

A Content Analysis of Research on Disability: American Counseling Association Journals Between 2003 and 2013

“…In addition, the mainstreaming disability legislations such as the ADA of 1990 and the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 2004 continue to call attention to the diverse mental health needs of IWDs that have been long neglected and the relevant intervention services for them (Etscheidt, 2002;Nolan & Moncure, 2012). In fact, these major legislative changes for IWDs have greatly affected the scope of the work and the role of rehabilitation counselors and other professional counselors who serve clients with disabilities in diverse counseling areas, such as school counseling (Frye Myers, 2005;Owens et al, 2011;Scarborough & Gilbride, 2006) and public health and managed care (Pelletier et al, 2013).…”

From Presidential Protection to Campus Security: A Brief History of Threat Assessment in North American Schools and Colleges

“…These practices include both the team's identifying, investigating, evaluating, and managing threats and other behaviors of concern and also broader campus policies and resources that support an effective campus threat assessment process (Deisinger et al, 2008;Nolan et al, 2011;Randazzo & Plummer, 2009). …”

“…In the opinion of some commentators, moreover, campus threat assessment is not merely a recommendation but an emerging standard of care, at least for U.S. colleges and universities (Nolan, Randazzo, & Deisinger, 2011). In 2008, the commonwealth of Virginia passed a law requiring public colleges and universities and the state of Illinois passed a law requiring all higher educational institutions to establish threat assessment teams.…”

“…3 The Standard references the work of Deisinger and Randazzo and their colleagues (Deisinger et al, 2008;Randazzo & Plummer, 2009) as guides for how to develop, implement, and operate a campus threat assessment program (ASME Innovative Technologies Institute, 2010). Legal commentators have even begun to consider possible liability for institutions that do not develop threat assessment teams or have teams but lack formal training in threat assessment, lack standard procedures for handling cases, or develop but fail to implement case management plans (Nolan et al, 2011).…”

“…First and foremost, they can serve as members of campus threat assessment teams, providing expertise on mental health and mental disorders. Although the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) and other laws and professional codes of ethics typically prevent mental health professionals from sharing information about specific patients except in certain circumstances, mental health professionals can help the team understand the symptoms of a particular disorder, the consequences of medication noncompliance, the implications of comorbidity, the purpose of various psychological tests, and the benefits of various treatment modalities (see e.g., Nolan et al, 2011). College mental health professionals can also support their institution's overall threat assessment mission by identifying and securing community mental health and support resources.…”