Transcripts For CSPAN3 Hearing 20240703

In the next 20 years, what is the most important change you would like to see in america . Or, over the past 20 years, what has been the most important change in america . As we do each year, we are giving away 100,000 in total prizes with a grand prize of 5000. Every teacher has the opportunity to share a portion of an additional 50,000. The competition deadline is friday, january 19th, 2024. Visit our website at studentcam. Org. Next, testimony on compensating student athletes for the use of their name, image and likeness. Athletic directors say regulations from congress are necessary to level the Playing Field and to protect student athletes. They testified before the house Small Business committee. Good morning. I now call the committee on Small Business and to order. Chair is authorized to declare a recess at anytime. I know recognize myself or my opening statement. Welcome to todays hearing which will focus on the impact of the ncaa name, image and likeness policy across College Athletics. I would like to thank all of our witnesses here today for the time as we discussed this potential issue. For the first 150 years, the individual College Athlete had no legal right to earn a profit from their athletic performance and was entitled nothing beyond s and board, meals and education. After a series of court cases force the ncaa to taser policy, College Athletics were allowed to monetize their name, image and like this overnight without affecting their playing eligibility. We are still in the early years of this new nil era, it is necessary to take a look on the positive and negative consequences of this drastic change in policy. To start with the obvious good, student athletes cannot profit during the time playing College Sports. Of the roughly 480,000 student athletes, fewer than 2 go on to play professional sports. In the first full year of nil, almost 1 million of bills made. Nil has opened up for testing new opportunities for athletes to look for different avenues to partner with big and Small Businesses. This not only allows the students to earn money but also allows them valuable business lessons that they can utilize after time playing College Sports. Whether it be negotiating contracts, navigating regulations are being exposed to paying taxes for the first time, all these skills are extremely valuable as we build up the new generation of entrepreneurs. Small businesses have been able to utilize athletes to market their business. While we often hear about athletes with massive deals, this is not the norm. Many of these deals are made between Small Businesses in communities. The symbolic relationship. A lot of good has come to this, it is not come without some negative repercussions. Individual states are stepping in and passing their own rules governing their universities. This patchwork approach is putting all the colleges and students who compete in a different states of choosing to comply with the state law, ncaa guidelines that might be conflicting. Im glad that we have two Athletic Directors here today that others in the complexity. Be able to shine some light of what will happen if we continue that overreaching set of rules and regulations that everyone follows. Additionally so much money changing hands, there has been an increased number of bad actors looking to take it manage of these College Athletes. Nbc news conducted an investigation where they reviewed dozens of nil contracts offered to high school athletes. They describe many of the deals as exploitive which commissions upward of 40 along with complex fee structures meant to confuse the athlete. In one instance, the contract was put in front. I think its important to bring attention to the side of the issue. When promises are being made but not kept. Without transparency, it is hard to know who was really working in the best interest of the student athlete. I played College Athletics myself and take this issue very personally. When i was in college, i received 10 a month called laundry money. I might angry the system has been changed. But i am passionate about keeping the system functioning for generations to come so the students will be able to experience what it means to truly be a student athlete. There are many reasons for having this hearing but i want to list a few. I want to know how we can inspire studentathletes to utilize the skills they learn navigating to start their own Small Business. I want to hear about the best practices that universities are doing to teach the student athletes everything they need to know and take advantage of the amazing opportunities that werent available for millions of athletes who came before them. And i want to discuss the appropriate role for the ncaa moving forward. I want to know how collectives are hoping student athletes and allowing them to compete. I want to know how nonrevenue generating sports that make money. I want you knew a fellow began womens sports are going to be negatively affected. I want to understand how these changes are affecting Graduation Rates and student athletes were constantly changing schools in charge. And i want to know how smaller markets will fare if theyre constantly having their players lured away. I greatly look forward to todays discussion i hope we will bring to light the different challenges and opportunities presented by the and il. My hope all nil policy changes are beneficial for student athletes above all else. Before i yield to Ranking Member elect to submit an oped for cruz on this issue and into the record. Without objections ordered. I this issue. I also ask unanimous consent on representative mike carey from ohio for the purpose of getting in without objection. With that, i yield to distinguished Ranking Member from new york for her opening statements. Thank you, mr. Chairman. This obsession with Americas College student has been top of mind ever since i began teaching courses in new yorks college many years ago. The ncaa 2021 decision to allow College Athletes to make a living off their own names, images and likeness or, nil, was welcome news. College athletes from underserved communities, even with modest deals could finally begin building savings and generational wealth. Many players before then had no way to cover rent and living li costs. In recent years, the launch and growth of the multimillion dollar collegiate athletic market has raised questions about the way that our society treats our College Athletes. Stakeholders from across the political spectrum have voiced concern about gender inequity, h predatory practices and the patchwork of confusing regulations. I am concerned with the growing trend of booster collectors steering the largest deals to the top athletes in football and mens basketball. They often closely coordinate with individual schools and can undermined the gender equity progress made by title ix and allow the collective to shortchange our women athletes. They haste to sleep drafted restrictions and suddenly have drawn College Athletes into their First Business experience to protect them, it is critical that these students be well equipped with the resources, knowhow, and a stable environment to succeed and build strong brands. Otherwise, we run the risk of distracting our students from their education. Today is our n chance to learn more about the opportunities and risk name, image, and likeness has created for our College Athletes so we can understand how best to support them. I look forward to hearing the testimony of the witnesses. With that, mr. Chairman, a yield back. Thank you very much. I now represent recognize representative mike carey. I want to thank the chairman and the Ranking Member for giving me this opportunity to make remarks. Nil is an extremely important issue and i appreciate the Small Business committee for holding this very important hearing. Thank you to the witnesses for your time today. We have an impressive lineup of witnesses that includes gene smith, who was a good friend of mine and who has done a tremendous job leading these ohio state athletic departments over the past 18 years. Has some of you know, gene smith has recently announced his retirement. Although we are sorry to see you go, i would like to congratulate you on an incredible career. Being from columbus ohio, the home of the ohio State University, i have taken great interest in the implementation of nil in College Sports. Leading me, along with my dear friend and fellow ohio and colleague Greg Williamson to introduce the act. In addition to earning money to help support themselves and their families, nil allows student athletes to learn about personal finance, marketing, taxes and business in general, all of the Lessons Learned will supplement their learning in the classroom and will help set them up for life after college. This is not to say that there are problems with the current state of the nil. Without the proper education and guidance, there is a potential for studentathletes to be taken advantage of. By no means am i saying that there are predatory practices commonplace in the nil but it would be disingenuous to say that they are nonexistent. Another problem is that numerous states have implemented conflicting nil laws, therefore making the landscape for the nil hard to navigate for both the universities as well as our students. Congress needs to pass legislation that will create a federal standard for nil focused on protecting the recruitment process, increasing transparency in the marketplace and implementing unfortunate mechanisms against those bad actors. This legislation, my legislation would include the prohibition of inducement, a registration requirement for agents, congressional oversight and the establishment of a clearinghouse for nil deals to be uploaded. I look forward to working with my colleagues on passing legislation that would create one federal standard to even the Playing Field, protect our studentathletes and the future of all College Athletics. I feel confident that the house will be able to pass nil legislation this congress. I just want to thank you for holding this important hearing. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, i yield back. Thank you, congressman. I will now introduce our witnesses. Our first witness here with us today is jeremiah donati. He is a director of Intercollegiate Athletics and Texas Christian University located in fort worth, texas. Under him, the 22, 2023 season was the most successful in the 150 year history. They were the only school to make it to College Football playoffs, conference world series and the ncaa basketball tournament in the same academic year. These are the most high profile sports. Tcu also saw success in a number of other sports, ranked number one in the nation over the course of the year. Prior to being point of director of intercollegiate ar athletics, he served as a deputy director. He attended the university of puget sound, earning his bachelor of arts in politics and government and attended Whittier Law School where he earned sports and entertainment. Mr. Donati, thank you for being with us today and we look forward to hearing from you. Next witness here with us today is mr. Gene smith from a School Called the school. I dont understand that. Anyway, mr. Smith is a Senior Vice President at the ohio State University. Mr. Smith is only the eighth Athletic Director and ohio state history and has had the thirdlargest tenure, having served in the position since 2005 and being promoted to Senior Vice President and Athletic Director in may 2016. Prior to your time at ohio state, he served as Athletic Director at Arizona State university, Iowa State University and eastern michigan university. Mr. Smith served in the ncaa, us nil working group and is on the board of directors at the National Football foundation, among others. Mr. Smith was a College Athlete himself and attended the university of notre dame where he received his bachelors degree in business administration. Mr. Smith, thank you for joining us today and we look over to the conversation i had. Our next witness here with us today is mr. Gino torretta. He is a Heisman Trophy winner and a two Time National champion as well as a member of the College Football hall of name. He attended the university of miami where he played for the miami hurricanes football team, winning the National Championship in 1989 as well as in 1991. Mr. Torretta went on to win Heisman Trophy in 1992. After his time attending the university of miami, he played for several teams in the nfl including the minnesota vikings, Detroit Lions and sou seattle seahawks. Following his time playing for the nfl, he joined as a senior Financial Advisor and chairman and ceo of touched on radio. Mr. Torretta graduated from the university of miami with a degree in business management. Mr. Torretta, thank you for joining us today and we look forward to discussing this important topic with you. I now recognize the Ranking Member from new york. I will briefly introduce the last witness. Thank you. I would like to welcome the Vice President of the College Football association. Madeline salamone is an attorney and College Athlete. In her college years, she played lacrosse for Duke University and entered her first year as ranked number sixc nationwide. However, her colleagues involved many battles with injuries, resulting in surgery. These challenges gave her a deep understanding of the physical, mental, and emotional issues that many College Athletes and door. She also chairs the Ncaa Division i student athletes advisory committee, serving on rules, legislative and leadership roles. Her tireless advocacy led to the granting of voting power for College Athletes at all ll levels of ncaas governance. As an attorney, she has represented College Athletes on matters related to athletic eligibility, scholarship appeals and Mental Health issues. Ms. Madeline salamone holds a bachelors degree from the university of North Carolina school of law. Welcome and thank you. Thank you. We appreciate all of you being here today. Before recognizing the witnesses, i would like to remind them that the oral testimony is restricted to five minutes in length. If you see the light turn red in front of you, it means your five minutes has concluded and you should wrap up your time. With that, i now recognize mr. Donati for his fiveminute opening remarks. Chairman williams, Ranking Member and distinguished members of the committee, thank you for allowing me to be here today. As someone who is passionate about College Athletics and the opportunity to positively impact young peoples lives, it is an honor to testify before you. Not since the creation and implementation of title ix over 50 years ago have we seen such changes of this magnitude. It is my hope that any experiences i can draw from may be helpful as we collectively Seek Solutions to complicated issues, none larger than nil. I have over 15 Years Experience working in College Athletics and i have been the director for the past six years. I also have experience working in the Sports Agency business, representing the interests of professional athletes and coaches. These experiences have given me a unique perspective on many aspects of our business, especially nil. The concept of allowing student athletes to receive compensation for the use alof their nil makes great sense. The vast majority of College Student athletes will not play professionally and it only seems fair that they should be able to monetize their skills and talent. In 2021, the and ill became permissible and student athletes could enjoy the same rights as ordinary College Students. Overnight, they became entrepreneurs and we began seeing them signing endorsement deals for companies and products. Other nal activities soon followed, autograph activities and community services. In many cases, it became apparent that they were using this additional income to better support their families. This is a reality for so many of our young people that is often overlooked and another reason why it has been very beneficial. Simply putting money in the pockets of student athletes is not the only value the nil brings to their lives. There is a tremendous opportunity to educate and give student athletes a set of tools more valuable than any payment. Following the enactment, many Athletics Departments, including tcu and build Educational Programs focused on Financial Literacy, contract negotiations, business formations, entrepreneurship, brand management, social media promotion and taxation. Like others, we saw this opportunity to further our mission and form between the Athletics Department in the ur Business School. To illustrate our commitment, we created this professorship l in support of the nil education, created courses for credits, office hours with ch Business School faculty and dedicated a football suite at the stadium and converted the day to day use for the teaching and instruction of madeline nd salamone nil entrepreneurship. To date, half of our student athletes have reported nil deals. While football, basketball and baseball have dominated, i have been encouraged to see many other sports participating at a much higher level than anticipated. Despite the positives that heha come from nil, it has come with a significant number of challenges. From the outset, the lack of uniformity has caused confusion. Nil was implemented without the proper guardrails or mechanisms necessary to effectively manage these changes and none of these shortcomings had approved the legal challenges or have made a different to find Sustainable Solutions. Bad actors or those who break the rules and exploit for their personal gain, pay to play third parties, are among the unintended consequences that have largely gone unchecked to date. We now find ourselves in the wild wild west environment across College Athletics with little accountability. Sadly, there are countless stories of alstudent athletes being exploited for personal gain in these pursuits. While nil collectives have provided universities with the tool to fill activities from donor support, the governance and oversight of these organizations has been inconsistent and in desperate need of uniform oversight. The good news is there are solutions available. Recently we have seen progress from federal legislation bills. I know i am not alone in my belief that congress has the power to bring uniformity, transparency and fairness to the administration of nil to enact legislation that should include one, oversight, two, standardize contracts, three, a national registry, four, elimination of inducements and pay for play, five, rule Enforcement Mechanisms. I speak to my Athletic Director colleagues and i say the current model is not sustainable and we all desire to see student athletes competing under the same fundamental and enforceable rules. I strongly encourage this ll committee and other members of the house to support legislation that will help provide Sustainable Solutions while preserving the opportunity for student financially benefit for their skills and talents. Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today and i am happy to answer any questions. Thank you. I now recognize mr. Smith for his fiveminute opening remarks. Thank you, chairman williams and Ranking Member velasquez, distinguished members of the committee. I will try not to be repetitious. I will reduce my opening comment significantly as a result of what has been said. We have 36 athletic programs and more than 1000 student athletes were permitted we are committed to providing athletes to what they need to grow athletically, socially and graduate with skills to transfer to a successful life. We focus on recruitment to or career which is evidenced by our over 90 of our graduating seniors moving right into jobs or graduate schools. I significantly believe the and il is beneficial to the Student Athlete Experience and has been more successful than portrayed. It allows the same privileges including the ability to monetize their personal brand or business acumen. Nil is a great educational tool student athletes learn about a host of important entrepreneurial skills such as fiscal responsibility, personal Brand Development and marketing. I believe the Lessons Learned further strengthen the Holistic Development of a Young Persons skills. Our mission at ohio state related to nil is to inspire c innovative thinking and assure that student athletes have their resources with their personal brand. Over 420 of our student athletes have one nil deal. They have made over 2000 nil deals among all sports with football and Womens Basketball volleyball attending the most. Not all student athletes are on full scholarship. In fact, most olympic state athletes are on partial scholarship. Many parts of scholarship student athletes graduated with debt. These opportunities offer the opportunities to possibly mitigate that debt. Nil implementation has been without challenges has not been without challenges so i wont go through that. Since institutions cannot manage nil on behalf of student athletes, collectives have formed. There is the intent of soliciting funds and developing deals. As a result of an irs interpretation, many collectors are shifting to limited liability corporations. In many markets, the efforts of the llcs are in direct competition. While these efforts ensure they are beneficial in the short line, Athletic Directors are finding themselves with declining income strings which could put our student athletes in the future. Many states have created legislation to support the institutions activities but there is no uniformity to these state laws. As you all know, we do not have a enteral law regarding nil. Nil offers tremendous opportunities for student athletes to learn and grow. Protections need to be put in place. I believe Congress Needs to enact nil legislation as soon as possible and the deal should include a national nil standard , nil agent ar registration. There are great agents out there but there are scrupulous characters. Standard nil contracts, the difference between athletics at our level and the pro sports as we recruit. Draft makes it impossible for the bad actors to enter that space. A public registry to bring transparency to the ua marketplace. No other industry does not have a marketplace where you can evaluate the marketplace and make good decisions as you move forward. Thank you so much for the opportunity to testify. I appreciate it. Mr. Torretta for his opening remarks. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. As one who has been engaged in College Athletics since 1988 as an athlete and broadcaster, i am honored to provide you my insights on n. I. L. And the impact on athletes. Collegiate athletics supported me with unique opportunities to help me be where i am today. I grew up in a small town. 17 years old, i decided to leave california and go to university of miami for a chance to compete for a National Championship and earn a degree. I spent five years there, was a member of two National Championship teams. After my senior season in 1992, i won the maxwell trophy, the player of the year, toyota Leadership Award and every award that i could win or that you could win as an offensive player in collegiate football. Five years in the National Football league. During my time with the miami hurricane, the ncaa had rules in place regarding transfers and there was no ability to monetize. With the passage of n. I. L. In the creation of the transferor transfer portal, athletes are able to work, allowing all athletes to create their own Small Business and capitalize on the time. This window provides athletes with historic earning and savings before graduation. These experiences will be beneficial in their lives Going Forward. In College Athletics, one can always find examples of a player or institution not following the rules. When these rules have been broken in the past, it led to an athlete losing eligibility, the school being placed on probation, et cetera. With the current system, there is no standard set of rules. The ncaa lacks the enforcement and they only place guidelines on schools. They are following state laws that are different. Coaches, in any sport do not devise game plans within a different set of rules. They create game plans to follow the rules. Because the ncaa has failed to issue one set of rules for these schools to follow, i believe it is important that Congress Needs to step forward and level the Playing Field across the board with all universities amongst all sports, male, female, football, basketball, baseball, gymnastics, whatever sport it is. That is why we are here today, to hear the testimony. Again, thank you for the opportunity and i look forward to answering any questions you may have. Thank you very much. I now recognize madeline salamone. Tramon williams, members of the house committee, thank you for having me here today. Our other president is also in the audience today and i want to recognize him as well. I time as chair of the division i committee taught me that the only time there is real change was when the ncaa felt public pressure after Media Coverage to reveal the truth of what was going on in College Sports. This is the reason i continue to advocate for athletes and have become a leading voice for College Athletes rights over the years, speaking out publicly and providing insight into the ongoing major issues with in College Sports. The committee convened this hearing to discuss name, image, and likeness in College Sports and its impact entrepreneurial athletes. My understanding is the members of this committee are concerned about a number of news reports. I will also address the main topic at hand. The truth of the matter is that the continual discussion about n. I. L. , antitrust exemptions and Employment Status are a distraction created by the ncaa and member schools and exacerbated by the medias a constant coverage of the topic. The most important issues that must be addressed in College Sports are the abuse, mistreatment, and lack of attention to Player Health and safety at the hands of coaches and support staff. Even in the wake of recent allegations of mistreatment that demonstrate a cultural issue with in College Sports, it is incredibly how quickly the focus has shifted back to the n. I. L. No matter where we landed, we will have failed College Athletes if we continue to ignore a much more important issue of Player Health and well being which impact players lives both during and after college. The primary remedy for athlete mistreatment is to have external oversight by individuals who are not employed by the school. O schools have repeatedly demonstrated that they cannot be trusted to police themselves. There are countless stories of individuals who have reported problematic coaches and staff and were subsequently silenced, fired or ignored and pushed out. It usually follows the more powerful and successful coach, the more peoples jobs are at risk and the harder schools will work. For every scandal that has been made public, there were countless others that remain the open secret. Players need accessible help they can trust with roles clearly defined. There must be independent oversight of practices, Team Meetings and medical care. Layers need access to individuals for whom they can seek advice and help without the ear that that individual breaks confidences and causes more harm. They need someone whose obligation is to them and not to the school, someone who can act as an mediator whenever necessary and advise players on the best course of action and they must have independent authority to take appropriate action with the information once they have it including the ability to investigate reported issues and bring issues eto the attention of the administration without risking their job. Those individuals need to be trained to handle confidential information and exercise discretion in addressing matters. I hope we get a chance to discuss these matters of College Athletes health, safety and welfare during this meeting. What is interesting about the reason we are all here today is because we are discussing n. I. L. As if it is a new complicated subject but it really isnt. Nothing about this area of the law is new, only how it applies to College Athletes. It is really just the right of publicity, which is another way to say the way a person can control their image. For years, the names and likenesses of professional athletes, models, actors and artists have been used to promote products that raise awareness. Past rules were simply preventing athletes from exercising the same rights already available to everyone else. Something we dont talk about is the additional benefits n. I. L. Gives beyond the financial. In addition to the nearly limitless entrepreneurial activities that athletes have and can now pursue, n. I. L. Has tremendous Educational Value as well. Athletes are developing skills that are applicable to direct sales, promotions, contract negotiations, brand of element and management. Athletes, more than ever are encouraged to think about what they want to do and to start setting themselves up for the future that they want. Previous generations of athletes have nowhere near the same opportunity as a realworld experience or preparing their futures for athletes. I outlined my written testimony areas where the n. I. L. Seems to be improved , education with review of contract but i believe these are relatively minor concerns within the overall landscape. As i have discussed, we can focus on the sports. We cannot allow any other athletes to negatively be impacted by issues that are preventable with the right oversight. Schools must be required to direct spending to the biggest issues these students are faced with which is the mental and physical health. These issues have the potential to negatively influence their lives with the influx of revenues and College Football playoff expansion in addition to revenue pouring in from Massive Media witness time is up. Thank you. I now recognize myself for five minutes. My first question would be to mr. Donati. What do student athletes need to regulate . In addition to the ncaa policy, students have a state law as well as the schools and the conference. Some of that is for a federal solution. While i agree that the uniform standard would provide certainty, everyone is playing by the same rules. My question is, what do you r think of the federal should have if any . I would say it would be with the ncaa. I would not say any of my colleagues or i expect the federal government to support the ncaa but the nature of n. I. L. , the complexities that come with it have made this unmanageable. My colleague, mr. Smith and i, believe that they can be involved in number of ways. I think there is a need for National Clearinghouse into these deals and then, the big question is, how will you enforce these rules . I think the federal government plays a major role as well. I would agree. Those are the colleagues where the federal government can help the most. The single most important element, in my view, is the inconsistency across the country. The ncaa, even if we have the ability or the model to come up and address the other issue is difficult for the ncaa to come up with a strategy to create a level Playing Field across thisn country when it comes to multiple state laws. I think we need help in that particular area. Student athletes are being taken advantage of and that is saddening. It is sickening to read some of the reports where we allow these characters or bad actors to take advantage of families and young people, especially people from disadvantaged environments. That is one area that the federal government can help in. The first year saw nearly 1 billion of deals and there is nothing to hint that the number is slowing down. This is was some has described as the new wild west. Unfortunately, there are some bad actors. We have heard Horror Stories that accompany the right to use the athletes name and image in perpetuity for their brand and one student athlete moves from georgia to california and can only be suspended by california governing bodies and suspended for a year. A predatory loan was disguised as an and il deal which included turning over 15 of any professional. My question is, what can be done to ensure that student athletes are not being taken advantage of by these bad actors . That is where law needs to come into play. Take advantage o you mentioned a student athlete who has been looking at a lawsuit where he signed to pay 16 of his student future earnings to a collective. That requires national law. That is not something that the ncaa can deal with. We need help in that particular space. Thank you. You got one of the most impressive resumes any College Football player could dream of. Walk through your time playing football in miami, your first start with the Heisman Trophy. How might that have played out differently . In 1989, we had an injury. I started four games in the middle of our National Championship year. I broke the School Record for passing in my second start. At the end of the four games, i went back to the bench and knew i would sit the bench. In todays day and age, i would look elsewhere. You had to sit out a full season. There would have been inducements of n. I. L. Money to come to whatever school and my story does not turn out like it has today. For the good of n. I. L. And transfer portal, the grass is not always greener on the other side. In all of these questions, it will take an adult to step forward. In fact, i will call nthese kids. From 18 to 22, you are still a kid in my eyes. Put up some guardrails and get some enforcement to the actual rules. Thank you. I now recognize the Ranking Member for five minutes of questions. Ms. Salamone, as he wrote in your testimony, many boost their collective primarily to mail colleague athletes. Can you confirm to us whether this distribution is proportionate among men and women . I would say that primarily, the collectives are steering money toward football athletes over every other sport. That is disproportionately male as opposed to female. I had someone explain a collective to me in a very good way and it was described as a club. These collectives basically operate as the behest of the coaches to direct funds to specific players that they identify. This is happening because booster collectives are not regulated by title ix, correct . In part. I think the collectives came apart as schools not wanting to deal with the funds because they were concerned about having to comply with title ix. This is a work around. This is so closely knit at this point that title ix should apply. Would you agree that booster collectives who coordinate closely with the school, are to be considered sanctions of their school out right and the subject to title ix regulations . Yes. Collectives are extensions of the schools. Some stakeholders worry that the predominance of social media influencing deals in the markets for women College Athletes is incentivizing them to post suggestive content. This is a greater societal issue. There are issues with student athletes feeling pressured to post certain types of posts that may gain more attention. I think what that comes down to is a greater need for messaging around that in conversations with female athletes in particular about staying authentic, doing things that make you feel comfortable, not feeling pressured by an agent, anybody else. There is a lot of social media branding, specialists that are encouraging athletes to do all sorts of things in social media. I think that schools should step in and remind athletes that they should not feel added pressure. Females in society on social media dont feel the same pressure. I dont think it is unique to athletes at this point. That is a greater debate over whether we feel comfortable es with the pressure on women in general with certain posts on social media. So, race and Sexual Orientation play immense roles in this dynamic, as i see it. This is a correlation between successful female n. I. L. Learners and more traditional race and Sexual Orientation or even education i think what you are asking is, are they feeling pressure because they feel the success of other people making money on social media . Certainly. I will go back to that is a greater pressure that content creators in general feel when they see things that are working for other content creators and it goes back to athletes needing to be reminded to stay true to themselves, not to feel the pressure and focus on the sport. They are part of this generation. They grew up in the social media world. It is a reality. They have a different mindset than we do. That has to be taken into consideration. When anybody sees what anybody else is doing is being successful, they are inclined to want to copy that. Thank you. You said there is a need to prioritize health, safety, and wellbeing for College Athletes in any congressional action in this state. Why is this critical to the success of n. I. L. Businesses . If an athlete is being abused, if they are mentally suffering like any other person in business, if theyre not taking care of themselves and living a wellbalanced life, their businesses are going to suffer. Based on your experience, can you tell me if colleges are putting resources into helping athletes . Many schools are putting resources. There is a tremendous gap that i will touch on. My fellow analyst here one of the ways that we can address some of the contractual issues is to educate about things to look for in a contract, what sort of processes to look out for and guard against them. Thank you. I now representative recognize the representative from and sylvania for five minutes. Thank you. Thank you for being with us. It is always enjoyable to talk about football, typically in the middle of the day on wednesday. These are pretty important subjects weve got here. O the idea of us having congressional legislation seems for us to be agreed upon by all. When i conclude, i will ask you whos got the plan. You clearly are all specialists in this and have great experiences. Think about that a little bit. Who else do we go to for gaining and developing, creating the right plan moving forward. No one disagrees that a student athlete i have always felt, even in the days of tim tebow, for instance, the idea that he could not get a nike contract or whatever it might be did not make any sense to me. I son plays now and has a good time. The idea that they could not use their name for a local business or car dealership, never really made any sense as a side job. This has gone further. Now we have alumni coming to gather, putting millions of dollars into a pot. Some schools may be tens of thousands and doling that out to gain the best quarterback, the best Team Possible with contractors that have no regulations or jurisdictions where some states are putting themselves in the middle of it. The first question is, do you think we have a problem just s with that amount of money just for this purpose . The revenues for the Football Program cannot be used. With that funding from generous donors, or donors who just want to win football games, would it be going elsewhere . Is it being pulled from other funding that would build a library, perhaps . Absolutely. The money that is being put into n. I. L. , there are donors making decisions on how they will best support the university, whether it is through the support of n. I. L. Per student athletes or funding the ability or scholarship. We are seeing that in real time and we are having to make adjustments of our budget accordingly. Mr. Smith, do you agree with that . One thing we have to recognize is that there is over 350 Division Schools in this country and the diversity and how they are financed is significantly different. Many of the schools we are blessed to have will educate our children. The ethnic departments are funded for student athletes. They are not like ohio state. We generate over 250 million externally through our Revenue Generation plan which covers our expenses. Contribute dollars back to the institution. Part of the reality is that we are listening to comments about places that dont do it right. We educate our student athletes. We dont have the same issues relative to fundraising that my colleagues mentioned. Our donors are going to support us at the end of the day. It is diversity in our business that is significant. We need to recognize that and Pay Attention to that. In my view, the plan is represented in some of the bills that have been offered but there are other plants that the ncaa is working on that i think need to be in place to allow more institutional involvement. It gets to the title ix question. At the end of the day, i make sure we have title ix. It is a long speech, to your question. I appreciate it. That is reality. Under the current system, the universities are getting free labor still. Additional cash is coming from l the boosters to the players. Is it a percentage of revenue to the student athletes . Under the current system, it does not cost any more. I would like to follow you up and ask you what is followed by that. I now representative mcgarvey for five minutes. Being from kentucky, we love our College Sports. There is particular interest to me. This is the first time in our committee that i have seen an organization come forward before us who does not have its act together and is so inept that they are asking the government to take over what is going on and regulate this. I was the Senate Minority leader in the state of kentucky. I work with our universities. I authored and passed it within six months. We had good things in there. We had good things in there protecting the players. We had a provision in there. If we signed a contract in college, it was void if you wanted it to be when you went professional. We had 18yearold kids that were signing up for contracts when they went to college. They are obligated to that after they go. The ncaa is the best institution to handle this. The next best institution is up. The last institution is the state legislature. I am a state legislature at heart but you saw this patchwork of law that led us to being here today. Here is my warning. Just like we did in kentucky. When you all are asking the United States government where it will take an act of congress to change everything once we let it out loose in the wild, is the ncaa so inept right now that this is something that Congress Must legislate . Somebody needs to step forward and apparently they are not stepping forward. Essentially, what we all want is a level Playing Field among tcu, ohio state, tcu, texas where the athletic departments are playing with the same set of rules. You lineup on saturday and you know there will be 11 on defense. Will kentucky play with 12 without the same set of rules as florida . That is what i think everybody wants to protect the games that they all play. If the ncaa will not step forward, that is why we are here to say maybe congress can put the images on to say maybe these are things that need to happen. I will take some of the silence as an answer. We do need to step forward. We need to make sure we are creating this level Playing Field. We are missing the National Standard right now. I have a question for you specifically. How can we use a name, image and likeness. If we are going to do it, lets do it right. Lets not try to come back here and fix it. Had we improve this including after when their careers are over . We start with independent oversight as i mentioned in my testimony previously. We need organization of players. They need to be able to collectively bargain. I think it would take care of a lot of issues the ncaa is concerned with when it comes to issues of antitrust. Players will get a seat at the table and will talk about the information that is most important. Legislators dont have to come s in and create legislation that matter to the players. The only way to know that is tok talk to players themselves. I wish we had a ton more time. There is a lot of things we have to deal with. How do we make this so it is right . One thing about athlete well being, we see this realignment n going on. How does that impact player wellbeing and what does it do for player athletes . I will comment that i did not go to stanford. I did not go on a recruiting visit. For lacrosse, it meant traveling so much to play with anyone good. It means, for most of the sports that dont have chartered flights, flights in the middle the night. It is exhausting. It is going across time zones. It does not make any sense and the fan bases are all over the place. It is fun to play local and have rivals that are nearby. It makes absolutely no sense to have coast to coast competition. I have a lot more questions as you guys can tell. I think we do have to step in and step up and i want to make sure we get it right. We literally will have to get congress to act again if we want to change something. Thank you. I now recognize representative van dyne for five minutes. Thank you to our witnesses for coming today. I have a few questions. Mr. Meador and i went to the same undergraduate school. We are not known for our football team. Can i ask, how difficult will smaller schools be able to stay competitive when the larger schools can afford to pay athletes more . I am not sure which of you would like to answer that question but how are we responsible for people to compete with the school the can raise 250 million like that and know that they will be able to do that . That is not new. The ohio State University has always been one of the larger state institutions in our country. Schools have found other ways to compete. What is different here is the amount of money that is going unchecked into the n. I. L. World and the n. I. L. Business. It is a reality. There is a lot of talent in our country. While there are some competitive inequities, i am more focused on the rules by which we are added. This is the difference of patchwork in state laws. Those are providing the competitive inequities. The money is not new. There will be large schools, alumni bases and smaller schools. It is not new. Just another tool . What are the challenges . If the institutions had the model and they were paying the money, then the challenges would be at the smaller schools. How could they afford to do it . If you are looking at the mid american conference, those president s will have to make a decision on whether or not they will continue to fund athletics. The majority of those come from the general funds. Students on the campuses can decide whether they will continue to pay the fees to support athletics. Now you are paying the athletes i go to school with . There is a lot of dynamics at that level that will come into play. Speaking of dynamics, how difficult do you think it would be to coach students that are making more money than the coaches . Nobody wants to add that one. To answer your question, they cant. It is smaller schools. If a school like harvard was the largest in the world and wanted to invest in the Football Program, they could spend as much. Harvard is my alma mater, by the way. Our coaches recognize this different environment. It has not been a challenge yet. I would also add that there needs to be a mindset shift and the coaches need to get over their own egos when it comes to that and be encouraging their athletes to set themselves up for a future of success. That should be the focus. It is an Educational Institution they are focused on. That is not the role of a coaching college. You dont think the students would get more full of themselves and be more difficult to coach . Still being students as opposed to professional athletes . It commands respect of your team. That is the deeper issue. These coaches havent figured it out. Can you explain what collectives are and what impact they have had on College Sports . I dont disagree with the description. They are switching to the llcs and they are creating activities and events and podcasts and things of that nature. Some of them are helping studentathletes connect with local businesses and actually doing real good and il work. Thank you. I yield back. Thank you all for being here. As mr. Kerry said before he had to leave, also from ohio, the two of us had a bipartisan bill. I believe it is straightforward and it would be a win for this congress. It creates the kind of structure and transparency we have been talking about in this hearing. The three things that have come up, the National Oversight, the National Clearinghouse, making sure that folks who are part of these transactions are registered and that the deals are disclosed. A question for all of you, thoughts on the bill . My hope is that we take this bill up as a congress and it can be passed and we can provide meaningful structure and transparency. We have these three aspects of the bill. Those were some of the critical aspects. Thank you for bringing this forward. These are some of the critical aspects we are looking for. I commend you. I would definitely support that. I concur. I think the bill had all of the elements needed. I support it wholeheartedly. I believe many of my colleagues would as well. Transparency, registration is what the world needs but i also think it needs enforcement. Will that be the ncaa . If they are not going to step forward then congress has to step forward and enforce it. Agreed. Some of the issues with the bills i have seen are the mechanisms by which they accomplish. They are not bad goals. It is whether it is more appropriate for them to happen with collective bargaining to figure that out. Can you say more on that . Some of the issues that are being addressed in many of these bills is everything but the kitchen sink. What i eluded to earlier with legislators that they think will be a good idea and, in practice, work, but may not necessarily have it fixed. To that point, you talk about, rightfully so, the safety, health, wellbeing of as being critical, most importantly. Obviously, supporting efforts to create structure, transparency in the n. I. L. Space but also appreciate that there are these other issues. This may be a dumb question. Should they be taken up separately . How related are they . I think that these bills are trying to do too much and they are ineffective and will not pass. On the health and safety piece, i would think something very similar. It is National Oversight. Those are deeper issues thatf require more attention and i think that many of the bills have been rushed through and more thought needs to be given into the how of the bill. Just as we wrap up bill t get combined with others but i hope we get to something past where weve been living in this wild west world. The National Oversight transparency and the right enforcement mechanism. Is that right . And the oversight as well. The other inducements of transferring one institution to the other i think that theyve advocated this their own. I now recognize the representative from the great state of texas. Thank you mr. Chairman and all of you for being here today. This is an important hearing and i dont know if the chairman mentioned it or not because hes always very humble about this but hes in the hall of fame and i wont tell you what year he got inducted. But hes great at telling stories about how it was being drafted into being a College Athlete and how little money they made. My grandfather class of 1937 was 21st in the draft in 1937 played for the eagles for two years, 37, 38 and 39. Cut short, dont know why. But as we talk about the subject how much could it have helped roger and how much could it have helped my grandfather into these young men and women that are going through this today and i agree with the chairman we dont Want Congress making the rules here but its clear that there needs to be some definite readjustment of how we do this because so many of these young men and women i know at 18 i wouldnt have had any ability i would like to suggest and ask the director having been in agent before and not being an Athletic Director at holistically how do you guide these young men and women . What do you automatically do but what do you think should be done systemwide to ensure these young men and women may not have any background or guidance from home or direction in their lives how to manage that money how to prepare themselves for the Football Player that somehow doesnt have a degree or much of one and no ability to make a living after that. We see it all the time. How are we going to do that with these young College Students . We have to double down on education. That is a key aspect of this unit you heard my colleague bring it up as well is the hall of fame chairman. One of the first things we lead off our semester with into the school year with his the education because we realized in these days if students feel like they are mis advised her not giving appropriate advice, they have other options which i think is a good thing. So we take it very seriously because one of the things that keeps me up at night is april 15th because that is when taxes come and do so we spend a lot of time with our young men and women to make sure theyve done the appropriate work they filed their taxes. When we were certified in washington, d. C. There were rules in place in which you could weed out the bad actors, so i think that kind of standard at the federal level would do massive good in the world right now. Director smith. The ohio State University, are you doing something similar . Yes sir. We do the same thing. A nuance to your question lets be clear we do a lot of education. But its the third party that impresses that individual. Its an own goal that isnt an uncle thats difficult for us to give to and many of the deals are cut back down so thats a challenge that we have in our space. Do you know it benefited from that kind of guidance . I think we read about it in professional baseball, basketball, football where a player has made significant amounts of money and they were not wise with it or they were taken advantage of. You can try to educate as much as possible but like said you might have somebody that is close to you and maybe a Family Member some decisions are made and you try to protect and educate as best you can but youre not going to have that in 100 of the cases to get rid of the bad actors even with registration, nfl has registration with financial lead buyers and agents and there are still issues with people that are registered so i think you can educate all you want you to do what you can you do you hope that they listen because even if you are 32yearsold in the nfl the end of make a lot of money and they dont listen. My time is expired. I yield back. Representative from the great state of maryland for five minutes. Thank you very much mr. Chairman. I appreciate the opportunity to be part of this and im glad we are dealing with this for some of us weve been dealing with it for some time. But allow me on a point of personal privilege to call the attention weve been joined by tom mcmillan who many of you will recall his great years at the university and recall the olympic team and member of this body in the 100th. Thomas, its great to see you back up on the hill. Mr. Chairman, ive been listening. I think there are two aspects that continue to come after me about what we are dealing with today. One is a police aspect of what has to be done and in other words, whos going to set the rules and enforce them. The other one is the information we heard about if i can use a better term, may be prevention. The care of the athlete and why things seem to be as bad as they are in some respects. I spent 12 years on the Johns Hopkins board of trustees. The last 30 on the board of regents at morgan State University and i can tell you from the public side colleges and universities really want guidance and information. Theres so much thats not clear in many respects. Universities and colleges approach this in a difficult manner and definitely in a different kind of looking glass. So i know that theres some apprehension about Congress Setting the law and the standard but if somebody doesnt do it it wont get it done and if it doesnt get done, things are going to happen. I appreciate the discussions here that weve had about agent registration. I think we are all kind of into nand on board with of that. I wouldnt refer to them as bad actors. The ones that are bad are more like leeches that take advantage of young kids and their families and of their uncertainties and they do it in a number of ways. On the standard contracts so whats here today is the same thing that will be there tomorrow and how we operate on the issue ten years from now. At the same for the lack of a better term find a way to role in all sorts of things by the thirdparty to kind of induce the kids to make a decision and do a handsoff to say they sign with us. In many instances they are being introduced to psion and they dont have any defense of their own. We need strong enforcement measures. If those things are the things that we can agree on maybe thats where we ought to start looking Going Forward and i think that they do have to be two different approaches here. While im at it let me also talk about these booster collectives that operate outside of title ix on the prevention side im glad you brought up this whole issue about the health and wellbeing. Everybody told them to get back out there or youre going to be okay. Following the investigation it was determined that there was a culture in the Football Program that led to this kind of tragedy. The tragedies are happening everywhere. They dont get reported the same way and those are something on the prevention side that i think we have to deal with. I introduced with the help of some of you in this room the jordan mcnair act a couple of months ago in the congress that would put in place things that are really needed requiring the use of external defibrillators on the field and requiring the use of cold Water Equipment on the field. I just cant stress enough that while the name, image and likeness are important the health of the player also is extremely important. We have a role to find a way to protect that so i would hope that we could keep both approaches. This process of amending and maneuvering and managing these bills would hopefully get to a point that we dont have to sit before this committee and witnesses and others still saying what do we do, how do we do it and when do we get it done. The representative from the great state of florida. Thank you mr. Chairman and a Small Business committee. Its a big deal to have everybody here today. I cant really see you right now because the glare from euro Championship Ring is blinding me. We won the congressional baseball game under the leadership. He presented us with our rings and i lasted two days. It was just too heavy so i salute you for all that youve done and also i want to congratulate you this is the largest Committee Attendance that weve had and we felt drawn the secretary testifying downstairs, so the interest of College Athletics is certainly great around the country. Question, the elephant in the room is not roger williams, it is the fact that theres also another big impact to College Athletics. The name, image and likeness is a big deal but also this transfer portal. Whats the greatest impact right now or is it them together . I think you had the convergence of two major changes in College Athletics where youre allowed to transfer. Where in athlete didnt have the right of a coach left to change schools or. I came from california. Maybe i didnt like it after one semester and would have gone home but i couldnt transfer somewhere else without setting out a year of my eligibility so now you have that and then theres the freedom and with vn il we talked about the inducements of money is involved and gino is a good player and hes younger. Maybe we can pay him or his people to transfer him and i think the combination of that, yes its not good. Is the transfer portal good in and of itself, sure. It would add to the inducement piece, its not good for any of us sitting up here. I was a state legislator and remembered a few years ago i got a call from the then head coach of the university of florida and said if we dont pass a name image and likeness we are going to kill florida schools because everybody will go somewhere else. Is it a fair Playing Field among states . Is there a more lucrative colleges and other states or is it about equal . Do some states give you a better chance to make more money playing college . Theres differences among conferences. They make different amount of money. Thats why we are seeing the conference realignment and weve deemed that the west coast of california, oregon and washington kind of irrelevant. Although schools are moving to the big ten. Is it true what he says does he preach the truth right now . I dont know about preaching but what he said was pretty good. I think the core issue is in the transfer those things coming together with where we are weve got to remember transferring is a good thing. A student athletes deserve the same rights as other students. Regardless the institution where a student athletes decides to transfer weve got to make sure we understand why. If they are transferring because we made a commitment we didnt live up to then we need to look at the mirror, dont point the finger at the student athlete, so thats one. The reality is the big ten in particular have done a great job over the years of creating a culture that everybody else wants to be a part of. Thats just reality. Here is a tossup question for every panelist im going to ask you to give me a number and that is your confidence on the scale one to ten, ten being confident that the ncaa can handle this without congressional action. Zero confidence and definitely you need congress to jump in. Jeremy, what to say you for that number . Somewhere between zero and ten. I would say the new president Charlie Baker we have a lot of faith in him, but he needs help and he needs this congress help. We are firmly behind him, but this is a level of complexity 34. Four. Hope is eternal. I think it depends on the issue that we are talking about so i would take issue with the framing. I should say coach, i yield back. Thank you for that and i now recognize the representative from the great state of michigan for five minutes. It is a great estate, isnt it . With all due respect to the ohioans here. Thank you all so much for coming and testifying today. This is such an important issue as we see by the crowd gathered here. I know this to be such an important issue. Im the daughter of a sports reporter, was a student athlete myself. Never in a position for any of what we are talking about here today to be relevant. But the challenges of balancing the demands of school, of young adult hood and the demands of the physical aspects of athleticism are so challenging and come together around this important issue. My first question is for you. It was incredibly gripping to hear from your testimony how prevalent psychological abuse is for female athletes and the detrimental effects it can have on Mental Health. Continuing on some of my colleagues questions about putting the health and safety of student athletes front and center, i want to talk about the Mental Health aspects. Can you talk more about what systemic changes might need to be made for student athletes to have the Mental Health support and resources that they need both in general but particularly at this changing time . We know social media plays a huge role in the Mental Health components for young people today. And also, more broadly, what Enforcement Mechanisms need to be in place so that this toxicity can be reported and tracked and monitored . Also the enforcements oversight. Schools have very good people that work there but very much care about the athletes but when it comes to stepping up for an athlete, if it puts the school at risk of being exposed for some scandal, they have to put the school first and depending who is involved that can be an issue so independent oversight as a starter i think in terms of addressing Mental Health there are so many different components. Number one theres tremendous there is tremendouspressure to. You had to social media alone that came before and that already created a different world. These are young individuals that are learning who they are and how they exist in the world and trying to figure out what they are going to do in their lives and all of that feels enormous at that age so i think that they need in addition to Mental Health resources that are independent and not reporting to coaches what is being talked about they need people that understand what its like to be an athlete at that level to kind of counsel through on the basis theres been a lot of efforts put in around Mental Health and athletes are talking about it more than ever, but i think its a little bit of a stigma where you can identify other people. To face a hurdle. If they feel like they are trying to put on an act and it takes a lot of effort to keep that to be a good teammate while youre dealing with that its so many pressures. I mentioned in my opening testimony one of the things a lot of our student athletes come from underprivileged homes and a lot of times theres pressure on them so these resources now are going home to extended families so that to me has been a win and is something ive seen now representative from the great state of minnesota. Thank you for your testimony. From your experiences, it is very compelling. Hockey is one and i was fortunate to play hockey and when the National Championship and all these years later i could say i fooled them into deciding the contract and two of the brothers i played professionally. I havent heard a lot about schooling and grades into education. Eventually, we are done so i would like to talk more on the focus what are you doing with the student athletes that come in and sometimes when they come from underprivileged homes or what have you and they are making some good money. How do you balance that with their School Education and they arent going to be there forever. Im sure you saw people waste a lot of money and all of a sudden one day its over. How do you deal with that and prepare that student athlete . You just identified the greatest challenge of being in athletics director because you do inherit young men and women who are at your university to grow. Some are all years and some arent and some find out later in life they missed an opportunity and thats why we have systems in place to bring them back for the great conclusions down the road. We only have the ability to be with them so many hours of the day. We have to make the best use of those. I will give you an answer how we educate them. We have whats referred to we are allowed to provide student athletes up to 5,980 per year and we have a condition on receiving that money that they go through this Financial Literacy education so that is the requirement if there are no ifs ands or butts if you miss one of the sessions you dont receive the check so we do try to hold them accountable and its not a perfect science because we are dealing with 18 to 22yearold sometimes 23, but its the greatest challenge. Can you give your thoughts on what would happen if some of the proposals became law and before you answer that im one that necessarily wouldnt support the government being involved in forcing you on this. I would rather have the institutions into the professionals at this table make those decisions but if need be, in congress we can help. If we put the law forward, what does it do . I never wanted to come to the federal government to ask for help. Theyve made it difficult to come up with a strategy to deal with the issues that we are dealing with today. And frankly as you heard to be able to deal with it we dont see that happening so thats why we are here. To try to get across to everyone so that we can get it passed to past thethings we talked about e to agent management and all those type of things we really need help with, so i would say that the plan is around that that a priority. We cant just put them aside im out of time but thank you witnesses for your testimony and we appreciate your athleticism. The representative from the great state of michigan. Thank you mr. Chair. And i want to thank all the witnesses for being here and for their testimony. For the first time i was able to impress my children with my new job here. I want to thank the chairman for this hearing. I grew up in a family that didnt have anything to do with business or entrepreneurship. When i got my education i worked as a chemist and i wanted to start a business. I had no concept of how to manage the branding whether it is revenues, investments. Im looking at these people that have focused so much on developing their sports skills and many of them come from families that are not in the business. How do you teach these young people so they can look after themselves and make a good, sound, financial decision and have a Strategic Plan even when you start a business. How do you bring that entrepreneurship and ability to have a plan and make sure they dont get exploited by vested interest but they are able to make good decisions for themselves . I think all of us are into education and we are probably the only one with enough Higher Education where we can actually have programs specifically for student athletes to help them with that so i will give you one example. Many of them never worked in their lives, so when we sit them down and tell them its a requirement that they write a resume it starts the wheels turning to get them thinking about what am i putting here so then you begin to process to help them understand why its important to take advantage of the internships we have available throughout the rest of your career putting them in the Work Environment so that they can see what it means to be in the Work Environment. The Lessons Learned through Athletic Competition and practice is directly transferable to the Work Environment. How do we help them on their continuum to get to that and it takes a lot of programming and doggedness to make sure you work with those student athletes. Thats the highest priority that we have to prepare themselves before they work across the stage and to get that so i could go on and on. That is what im passionate about. One of the things we did at the universities like the ohio State University and other places weve got a top Business School in the country and top Athletics Program we said lets combine resources. So, we literally brought a piece of that Business School into the Athletics Department and created professorship and brought in the School Business and got to work on these skills. This is the good side and the positives because it is as big as any payment of these are tools they can take with them forever we still have some time left and members on their way back. For those of us here would you like to ask another round of questions . You want to talk about the university of maryland . I would like to get back. Your perspective i did not expect coming into this hearing. I read the testimonies but i figured we would talk about the regular things, the guardrails and but we need to do and oversight. I would like for you to talk some more about this aspect of the athlete to being a human being and how in the process of developing good athletes we make sure we are developing good human beings. You talked a lot about that with joe and i think that his father is someone who is doing tremendous work bringing that humanity to athletes there are many people that care about them. They lose sight of that when it comes to treating it like a job and forgetting even the best care about their employees and treat them well and with respect and care about them personally. I think we need to bring more of that mindset into coaching and to the administration and getting to know the athletes and what they care about, not just what they can do on the field on and on the court wherever their performance is. These are families that worked very hard but that cant do it all and sometimes buckle under the tremendous pressure. It is a lot of pressure. I would like to add on the independent oversight, which i agree with it becomes a selfpreservation for that administrator because that administrator is working for the institution. You know that they are going to have your best interest and i can go back to broadcasting the ballgame. They had a player come across the field. Hes back out there three plays later and i can remember thinking if i was his parent i would jump over the rail because who allowed that to happen and that is what the nfl has tried to deal with on the sideline. It becomes selfpreservation. We are familiar if i might for just a minute longer. Of the mountain of power and nobody wanted to check person a b or c and everybody was intimidated until it all blew up into the question became what did you know and what did you do about it and that is what the universities and colleges are faced with. I would say however that its important for the record there are a lot of good coaches out there who also dont know where to turn. Weve definitely got to figure out this notion of intimidation out of the game because people are fearful will i be demoted and shifted somewhere else in the university. Its more challenging for us. It comes to all of us individually do you have the courage to step up. Do you have the courage instead of filming on camera to actually stop whats going on and i think thats society in general stepping up if you see something say something. We see that in the airport. This is about leadership and culture. We probably could have won the National Championship last year if we have let them continue to play. What shes talking about is 100 right and structurally you need to put people in place that are the experts to make those type of decisions. My coaches and experts i dont know if you sold recently we had a session on cnn. Fortunately, we have empowered our coach to make sure that they are very sensitive and humanistic in those situations and then determine who is the experts to help that individual and that is the coach you have to create. You have to make sure that the individuals in your organization understand your talents and skills to be an powered to give those talents and things they have talents and skills and no authority over. I agree wholeheartedly. Thank you mr. Chairman for the extra time. I appreciate it. We are winding down on our time now and this will probably be the final question. Weve heard some questions today about collective questions in a negative light and this is missing some context. To get in contact to create these partnerships. You might touch on that real quick but one of you are all of you please talk about these collectives and how they came about and how they help your teams compete and if they do. They are here because theyve allowed them to be here and i think a number of them do it the right way. Im proud to say the collective that supports does it the right way. We work with them. We have a lot of communication with of them to understand how they are trying to accomplish and support our student athletes, but we know this isnt a sham. To make sure that the activities are happening, theyve gone heavy with community service. The student athletes are able to have a real impact in their lives, so not every collective works that way. It goes back to having some uniformity and oversight, but i think by and large collectives have been a good thing. Thank you for bringing that back to that attention because youre right weve talked about the negative side of it but theres a lot of collectives around the country that are doing good for young people and many of them for olympic sports athletes not just football and basketball. We talked earlier about title ix. So, yes, i agree there are so many the contributors i think sometimes the Small Business gets a negative connotation because if you have a Small Business you reach out. Is there a student athlete i would like to support and i think that collectives are formed for if i didnt have a Small Business but i wanted a support, i could give money to the collective and then they could disburse it and support the athletics. So i think there are good things come about without policing of anything, there are obviously going to be bad issues. I would echo that sentiment. I think there are collectives doing good work some of them are collectives organizations. I spoke to one person who told a story about i think one of the issues is athletes go to whoever can help them with certain issues and that isnt always. Its able to help by collecting them with the social worker that can collect them with what they are dealing with and its causing them difficulty where they were asking for money when what they really needed was help in other areas they were able to provide because they listen to so there are good people in this space doing good work but those are the type of issues again that go back to why its important to have players in the room to explain that to you that its not just about money but its about how can you help with these reallife things that happen outside of sports. Thank you and i just want to say that this has been a great hearing and its good to see so many of you in the audience that were Witnesses Today that care about this. I think it also shows we can get some bipartisan stuff done. But also the importance of this College Athletics to the country. I want to thank all of you for being here today. Without objection, members have five legislative days to submit additional materials and questions for the witnesses to the chair which will be forwarded to the witnesses. I would ask the witnesses to please respond properly when that happens. If there is no further business, the committee is now adjourned. Thank you