House Bill 772, the North Carolina Student Lifeline Act, requires a broad range of schools and postsecondary institutions to provide students with the phone numbers for the national Suicide and Crisis Lifeline and the NC Peer Warmline. The bill directs local school boards, charter schools, regional schools, laboratory schools, private church schools, qualified nonpublic schools, community colleges, and UNC constituent institutions to adopt policies ensuring that the numbers are shared with students and that the contact information is reviewed annually for accuracy.
The bill specifies multiple required places where the information must appear, including new student ID cards for grades 6-12, school websites, device home screens, agendas or calendars, suicide awareness materials, and registration documents. It also sets default wording for the numbers to use if no updated contact information exists, including 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, text HOME to 741741, and 855-733-7762 for the NC Peer Warmline. The act takes effect when it becomes law and applies beginning with the 2025-2026 school year.
HB 772 amends several sections of North Carolina education law, including provisions governing local boards of education, charter schools, regional schools, laboratory schools, private and nonpublic schools, community colleges, and UNC constituent institutions. It creates new policy obligations for these entities to disseminate crisis hotline information and to keep that information current, but it does not create a new program or funding mechanism. The practical effect is to standardize suicide-crisis and peer-support contact information across most public and private educational settings in the state.
The available record shows no committee transcript, recorded votes, or other debate excerpts, so there is no direct evidence of opposition or support in the provided materials. Based on the bill’s subject matter and its committee-favorable substitute status, the measure appears to have been treated as a straightforward student mental-health and safety bill. The overall tone of the legislation is preventive and informational rather than controversial.
No specific points of contention are documented in the provided context. Potential areas of concern, based on the bill text alone, could include the administrative burden of updating materials annually, the requirement to place hotline information on student IDs and digital devices, and the extension of the mandate to private church schools and nonpublic schools. However, the record supplied does not identify any sponsor, committee member, school representative, or other stakeholder as raising those issues.