NCAA Student Athletes as Employees Case Is ‘Pandora’s Box’ (1)

A pending National Labor Relations Board case on whether college athletes should be considered employees under federal labor law has the potential to send shock waves across higher education.

Hearings before an NLRB administrative law judge are set to start Nov. 7 over unfair labor practice charges against the National Collegiate Athletic Association, the University of Southern California, and the Pac-12 Conference.

The case, which the board refused to dismiss, concerns whether the three entities jointly employ student football and basketball players and whether they were illegally misclassified as “non-employee student-athletes.”

A decision to classify student athletes as employees ...