Restraining orders: educational institutions

Beginning July 1, 2029, college, vocational, and professional schools gain a direct court tool to address threats against the institution and its property, alongside existing protections for students.

What the law does ​

• Lets a postsecondary institution’s chief administrator or authorized campus-order official seek a temporary or longer-term restraining order for the institution and institution-owned campus property after learning of unlawful violence or a credible threat directed at a campus.
• Allows orders to bar harassment, threats, calls, emails, contact, property destruction, or coming within a set distance of a campus or facility.
• Treats repeated calls or correspondence, including emails, to the campus, its employees or students, or its chief administrator as conduct that can support an order.
• Requires the Judicial Council to adopt or update implementation forms by January 1, 2028.
• Preserves limits against orders restricting constitutionally protected speech or activity.

Who it affects ​

• Postsecondary educational institutions, including vocational and professional schools.
• Campus administrators and designated employees responsible for maintaining campus order.
• People accused of threatening, harassing, or committing violence against a campus, its employees, or students.
• Students and other people at a campus who face unlawful violence or credible threats.

Context ​

The new campus-protection authority becomes operative July 1, 2029.