Despite a landmark pay agreement for college athletes, a union push remains hot

Mississippi Rebels and Xavier Musketeers players run by the logo at mid-court during the second round of the 2015 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament at Jacksonville Veterans Memorial Arena on March 19, 2015 in Jacksonville, Florida. (Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images)

After a settlement between the NCAA and a class of current and former college athletes, students have finally won their largest demand: they will be paid via a revenue-sharing agreement, should a judge approve it.

Amid mounting pressure from labor activists and legislators, the NCAA and its partners settled the class-action suit with a $2.7 billion dollar sum and a payment model moving forward, but labor organizers say they don’t expect a cooling-off of their efforts to unionize student athletes around the country, who generate over a billion dollars in annual revenue.

At Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, where Ivy League men’s basketball players won a 13-2 bid to organize under the SEIU Local 560, the push to secure a collective bargaining agreement is heating up. 

“With this settlement, the NCAA continues to do everything it can to avoid free market competition,” Chris Peck, President of the SEIU Local 560 in Hanover, New Hampshire, told the Associated Press. “[The settlement] only supports our case that the NCAA and Dartmouth continue to perpetrate a form of disguised employment.”

The agreement, though a monumental victory in the fight for compensation for the value-generating class of athletes, does little to address the concerns of the union, including solidifying student athletes’ classification as employees. An NLRB ruling paved the way for Dartmouth’s push, identifying the athletes as employees citing Dartmouth’s “right to control the work performed” under their agreements.

Organizers didn’t dispute the fact that the settlement was a big win for student athletes. Per attorneys representing the greater class of NCAA students, the move will finally allow athletes to reap the benefits of their labor.

“This landmark settlement will bring college sports into the 21st century, with college athletes finally able to receive a fair share of the billions of dollars of revenue that they generate for their schools,” Steve Berman, attorney for the student athletes, said in a statement. “Our clients are the bedrock of the NCAA’s multibillion-dollar business and finally can be compensated in an equitable and just manner for their extraordinary athletic talents.”

NCAA lobbyists had urged Congress to pass a carve-out in antitrust law, even referencing the push in their statement on the settlement, now likely continuing to push for a designation of student athletes as non-employees. Ultimately, union organizers say that bargaining agreements, not just pay structures, are necessary to secure their rights within their workplace.

“The solution is not a special exemption or more congressional regulation that further undermines labor standards, but instead, NCAA member universities must follow the same antitrust and labor laws as everyone else,” Peck told the AP.

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