Tag: Players

  • FIRE Defends WVU Football Players’ Right to Dance on TikTok

    FIRE Defends WVU Football Players’ Right to Dance on TikTok

    West Virginia University’s football team is experiencing a digital Footloose: The coach has prohibited the players from dancing on TikTok. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression hopes to reverse the ban.

    In March, head football coach Rich Rodriguez told his players that while they could post on TikTok, they weren’t allowed to dance on the platform.

    “We have to have a hard edge … and you’re in there in your tights dancing on TikTok ain’t quite the image of our program that I want,” Rodriguez said, according to the Associated Press.

    @wvu_football ♬ original sound – WV football

    Rodriguez also said he wants the players to focus less on their individual performances and more on the team dynamic—and he believes not dancing on TikTok can help.

    FIRE responded by writing a letter last month to the university’s athletic director, Wren Baker, arguing that the ban on dancing violates the athletes’ First Amendment right to free expression.

    “WVU players don’t hand in their expressive rights when Rodriguez hands out shoulder pads at the start of training camp,” FIRE wrote in the letter. “Because student-athletes are students first, their right to free expression off the field must be commensurate to other students on campus.”

    When Baker failed to respond within a few weeks, FIRE sent another letter, which was posted on X.

    “Major NFL players like Tom Brady, Gronk [Rob Gronkowski], and the Kelce brothers maintain robust TikTok presences,” the letter read. “Coaches at public colleges can’t stop their players from posting online, because students—including athletes—have the First Amendment right to express themselves.”

    The policy isn’t written anywhere, as Front Office Sports learned after requesting a copy through the Freedom of Information Act, but FIRE claims “its existence and enforcement violates students’ expressive rights.”

    Some college athletes use their social media presences to generate revenue through name, image and likeness opportunities, and many of the top earners through NIL deals are colleges football players, though fewer of their brand opportunities are a result of social media dances.  

    An impending ban on TikTok makes the future of students in general posting on the platform less clear.



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  • National College Players Association Files Charges Seeking Employee Status for Student-Athletes – CUPA-HR

    National College Players Association Files Charges Seeking Employee Status for Student-Athletes – CUPA-HR

    by CUPA-HR | February 17, 2022

    On February 8, the National College Players Association (NCPA), an advocacy association for college athletes, filed unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) against the University of Southern California, the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the Pac-12 Conference and the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).

    The charges allege that the employers have violated the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) by “repeatedly misclassifying employees as ‘student-athlete’ nonemployees” and “by maintaining unlawful rules and policies in its handbook, including restricting communications with third parties.” The charges mark the launch of the NCPA’s #JforJustice campaign and aim “to affirm college athlete employee status for every [Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS)] football player and Division I basketball player at every public and private university in the nation,” per an NCPA statement.

    This is the latest development regarding issues surrounding employment status of student-athletes since NLRB General Counsel Abruzzo issued a memorandum last September stating her position that student-athletes are employees under the NLRA and are therefore afforded all statutory protections as prescribed under the law. In that memo, Abruzzo stated that it was her intent to “educate the public, especially Players at Academic Institutions, colleges and universities, athletic conferences and the NCAA” about her position in future appropriate cases.

    The NCPA charges potentially provide Abruzzo with a case she can present to the NLRB to consider granting collective bargaining rights to college athletes. In 2015, the last time the NLRB considered the issue, it declined to assert jurisdiction over Northwestern football players, as doing so “would not promote labor stability [because the] board does not have jurisdiction over state-run colleges and universities” that make up the majority of the FBS. The NCPA charge seeks to overcome this jurisdictional obstacle by including the privately-held Pac-12 and NCAA as joint employers of UCLA’s athletes — a theory of liability Abruzzo said she would consider applying in appropriate circumstances.

    Now that the charges have been filed, an NLRB regional director will review the case and determine whether formal action should be taken and presented to an administrative law judge, which would preside over a trial and issue a decision that could ultimately be taken up by the five-member board.

    CUPA-HR will be paying close attention to this case and provide members updates as it progresses.



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