Last March, the Dartmouth men’s basketball team took the unprecedented step of forming a union. The players voted 13-2 to become the first recognized union of a college athletic team in the United States.
The players wanted to be treated as workers, not just students. They said their busy schedules and the rules they had to follow made them more like employees. The National Labor Relations Board agreed, pointing out how much control Dartmouth had over the players – from practice times to travel plans, even what classes they could take and when they had to study.
One big issue was how much control the school had over the players. For example, players had to get special permission just to get a haircut during team trips. The school also controlled when players could practice, watch game films, and meet with alumni. While Dartmouth said these rules were for safety, they were much stricter than rules for regular students.
The players also had to give up their rights to use their own name and image. If players didn’t sign away these rights, they couldn’t be listed on the team’s website or be nominated for awards. Meanwhile, the school was using players’ images to raise money from donors without compensating the players.
But this past week the team changed course and dropped its union effort. Since gaining federal recognition last spring, Dartmouth had refused to bargain with the team to negotiate a working collective bargaining agreement.
Without an agreement, and with a new administration coming to Washington this month, the team and its union decided to pull the plug. The team and its union were worried that a new president will get to pick two new people for the labor board, which could make it harder for college athletes to be seen as employees.
The union leaders say they made this move to protect what they’d already won. By dropping the case now, they keep the earlier ruling that said players are employees, without risking having it overturned by the new administration’s appointees. This matters because other athletes might use this ruling to help their own cases in the future.
This case matters a lot for college sports today, especially with all the changes happening around players making money from their name and image (NIL) and being able to transfer to other schools more easily. The union president says working together through unions might be the only real way to handle these issues, since the NCAA is having trouble getting special protection from Congress.
Some people, like Senator Tommy Tuberville who is the former head football coach at Auburn University, worried that unions would destroy college sports. He said that if you want the federal government to ruin something, try to make student-athletes employees. But others see unions as a way to protect athletes’ rights.
Even though this particular union effort is over, the fight isn’t done. The union says it will keep pushing for better pay, health coverage, and safer conditions for college athletes. They’re planning to work on creating a group for all Ivy League players and expanding programs to help athletes make money from their rights. While the Dartmouth players may have stepped back for now, their effort has shown a possible new path for college athletes who want more rights and better treatment in the future.
The Law Office of Eric R. Brown 
Leave a comment