Vote Smart's Synopsis:

Vote to pass a bill that authorizes student-athletes to receive compensation for their name, image, and likeness in addition to other higher education provisions.

Highlights:

• Requires the Board of Regents for Higher Education and the Board of Trustees for the University of Connecticut, in consultation with the institutions of higher education in the state, to develop and adopt guidelines on awarding college credit for a student's military training, coursework, and education (Sec. 1.b).

• Establishes a task force to study the costs and benefits of establishing a Postsecondary Prison Education Program Office within the Department of Correction (Sec. 2.a).

• Requires the president of each institution to appoint individuals to the coalition that reflect their institution’s student body demographics, including, at least one member from their institution’s (Sec. § 3)

• Administration; 

• Counseling services office, if any;

• Health services office, if any;

• Senior and mid-level staff;

• Student body;

• Residential life office, if any;

• Faculty; and

• Any other individuals the president designates, including a community provider of mental health services.

• Requires each higher education institution’s governing board to adopt, and update as necessary, a student mental health policy by January 1, 2021. The policy must include (Sec. § 6):

• The mental health services and programming provided to students each academic year;

• The availability of, and eligibility requirements for, student mental health leave; and 

• The resources available for crisis response, imminent danger, and psychiatric hospitalization.

• Requires, by January 1, 2022, the Board of Regents for Higher Education to employ a grant writer to identify and apply for available grant funding to implement or improve mental health services and programs offered by the regional community-technical colleges to address student mental illness (Sec. § 7).

• Requires the state comptroller, in consultation with the Board of Regents (BOR) and UConn Board of Trustees (BOT) to study and develop a plan to extend eligibility for participation in the state’s group medical insurance plan to (Sec. § 8):

• Part-time, professional state system of higher education employees who have taught at least 90 credit hours in the aggregate at any university in the system; and

• Retired, part-time professional employees who have taught not less than 180 credit hours in aggregate within the system, regardless of whether the hours were completed at the rate of nine credits a semester.

• Requires each higher education institution to adopt at least one policy on student-athlete endorsement contracts and employment activities. The policy must identify any prohibited endorsements (i.e., the use of the student-athlete's person, name, image, or likeness in association with any product, category of companies, brands, or types of endorsement contracts) (Sec. § 14-5).

• Specifies the bill does not (Sec. § 14):

• Qualify a student-athlete's scholarship from a higher education institution as compensation or deem a student-athlete an institution’s employee;

• Require an institution to take any action that would violate the federal Discrimination Based on Sex and Blindness Act;

• Prohibit a student-athlete from engaging in an employment activity that entails coaching or performing a sport, if it is unrelated to an intercollegiate athletic program; or

• Prohibit an institution of higher education from using a student-athlete's name, image, or likeness in connection with official team activities.

Full Bill Text