First introduced in September 2003, the act is named for David Shick, a Georgetown University junior who died after hitting his head during a fight in a campus parking lot in February 2000. The U.S. Attorney's Office did not file criminal charges in the case. When the student implicated in his death appeared before the campus judiciary board, Georgetown officials assigned him a 10-page paper about the incident and a semester suspension. The board later granted the student a suspension deferment and he graduated in 2002 without serving it.

The university refused to inform Shick's parents of the outcome of the hearing unless they signed an agreement not to disclose the information to anyone–including David Shick's siblings. The Shicks declined and did not learn of the student's punishment until they filed a civil suit and won the information in an out-of-court settlement in 2001, according to The Georgetown Voice, an independent student publication.

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act allows universities to require non-disclosure agreements before releasing the results of disciplinary hearings but does not require it. In its current form, FERPA gives universities the option to publicize the information. If Congress passes H.R. 81, schools "shall disclose to the alleged victim of any crime of violence, or a nonforcible sex offense, the final results of any disciplinary proceeding," according to the proposed legislation. In cases like David Shick's, the school would have to release the information to the victim's family.

S. Daniel Carter, senior vice-president of Security on Campus, Inc., wrote a letter in July 2000 on behalf of the Shick family to Judy Johnson, director of student conduct at Georgetown.

"[The Shicks] believe, and we strongly agree, that in order to prevent future tragedies students must know that engaging in such reckless, dangerous behavior won't be tolerated. If these students were disciplined, other students need to see that example. If they weren't, parents and others may well want to see policies changed," Carter wrote.

Johnson defended Georgetown's non-disclosure policy to The Hoya, another Georgetown student newspaper, in 2002.

"It prohibits the individual complainant or victim from releasing information specific to the judicial findings and the sanctions that came of that," she told the newspaper. "It doesn't prohibit an individual from sharing his or her experiences."

H.R. 81 is currently before the 21st Century Competitiveness subcommittee, part of the Committee on Education and the Workforce.

–By Kate Campbell