[November 12, 2025, Memphis, T.N. AND New York, N.Y.] – The Pi Kappa Alpha International Fraternity (PIKE) is proud to announce its collaboration with The Jed Foundation (JED), a leading nonprofit that protects emotional health and helps prevents suicide for teens and young adults, to create Responding to a Suicide and Related Adverse Events: Postvention Guidance for the Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity. The new guide is a practical resource for PIKE brothers, chapter leaders, and alumni advisors on what to do in a mental health crisis and how to respond to various mental health situations, including the suicide of a fraternity brother or community member.
“The guide will well serve our undergraduate leaders and those who support them in moments of crisis,” said Kimberly Novak, Pi Kappa Alpha’s health & safety officer. “This is exactly the type of resource that the Blake Nicholas Caummisar Fund was established to support.”
“Postvention” refers to the strategies implemented in a community after a suicide to support those affected, promote healing, and reduce the risk of additional suicides. PIKE’s chapter leaders and advisors are trained to manage various challenges, such as organizing events, handling conflicts, and maintaining a safe living environment. However, specific guidance, training, or support on how chapter leaders and advisors should respond to a loss by suicide or a serious mental health challenge within a chapter is less common.
To address this need, the guide will provide chapter leaders and advisors with clear steps for responding to a brother’s suicide or serious mental health challenge. In this guide, leaders will learn about suicide postvention, how suicide affects the entire chapter and the fraternity and sorority life community broadly, and the immediate, short, and long-term steps they can take to support members while reducing the risk of further tragedy.
“Suicide loss is a catastrophic event for loved ones, peers, and communities. Greek-letter organizations are no exception. While it’s difficult to imagine losing a brother to suicide, it’s critical to have a customized and comprehensive suicide postvention plan in place for fraternities,” said Dr. Kurt Michael, JED’s senior clinical director. “We commend PIKE for their commitment to supporting chapter members, leaders, and advisors in addressing mental health challenges, reducing the risk of further loss, and connecting those impacted with resources to process their grief. In many ways, postvention is prevention and PIKE is helping to protect both their brotherhood and the broader campus community through this vital work.”
Some of the guidance contained in this newly developed guide resource was adapted from or aligned with already-established frameworks, including the 2014 Higher Education Mental Health Alliance (HEMHA) publication POSTVENTION: A Guide for Response to Suicide on College Campuses and the recently published Responding to a Suicide: Postvention Guidance for Student Housing Managers (JED, 2024).
Learn more about JED’s customizable suicide postvention consulting services for addressing the immediate needs of schools, campuses, and Greek-letter organizations.
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The Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity was founded at the University of Virginia in 1868 and has grown to an international brotherhood composed of more than 300,000 members, 200 chapters and 150 alumni associations. Pi Kappa Alpha has maintained the largest average chapter size of any inter/national fraternity for most of the past 20 years, and through its members has donated millions of hours and dollars to philanthropic causes and community organizations across North America.
About The Jed Foundation (JED)
JED is a nonprofit that protects emotional health and prevents suicide for our nation’s teens and young adults. We’re partnering with high schools, colleges, school districts, and youth-serving community-based organizations to strengthen their mental health, substance misuse, and suicide prevention programs and systems. We’re equipping teens and young adults with the skills and knowledge to help themselves and each other. We’re encouraging community awareness, understanding, and action for young adult mental health.
