The Parents' Perspective: When Politics Enters College Sports

When my child became a college athlete, I knew there would be a lot I couldn’t control. There would be wins and losses, injuries and long practices, early mornings and late nights. There would be coaches, teammates, travel, academics and all the emotions that come with watching your child compete at the highest level. What I did not expect was Congress.

I never imagined I would be reading proposed legislation or talking with other parents about federal policy. I was focused on my child: their education, health, happiness and future. But parents of college athletes can no longer ignore what is happening around our children. Decisions made in Washington can shape whether they compete, where they go to school, how they are compensated and what rights they have when something goes wrong.

Politics is now part of college sports. Parents have to pay attention.

The Rules Keep Changing

One of the hardest parts of being a college sports parent today is the uncertainty. Transfer rules change. Eligibility rules change. NIL rules change. Revenue-sharing rules change. Conferences shift. Coaches leave. Administrators come and go. Through it all, the people making these decisions can lose sight of the person at the center of them.

Our children are not transactions or line items. They are young adults trying to earn a degree, compete at the highest level and build a future beyond sports. A rule change is never just a change on paper. It can determine where an athlete lives, whether they can compete, whether they can stay with their team, how they pay for school or what opportunities remain open to them. When a policy fails, the people who wrote it rarely bear the consequences. Athletes and their families do.

Why I Started Paying Attention to Politics

For a long time, I thought politics and college sports were separate. I don’t anymore. When Congress considers legislation affecting eligibility, transfers, compensation, NIL or athlete rights, it is not debating an abstract policy. It is making decisions that could directly affect my child and thousands of others.

Parents should be asking basic questions: Who is writing these rules? Who benefits from them? Who can challenge them? Were athletes meaningfully involved? Those questions matter because college sports are built around the athletes who compete. They put their bodies on the line while balancing practices, travel, classes and the expectations that come with representing a university. They should have a meaningful role in writing the rules that govern their lives.

Stability Cannot Come at the Expense of Athletes

I understand why lawmakers want to bring stability to college sports. Parents want stability, too. We want clear rules. We want schools to honor their commitments. We want athletes to understand their rights and responsibilities before making decisions that could affect their futures. But stability cannot mean giving more control to the same institutions that created much of today’s uncertainty.

That is why the Protect College Sports Act concerns me. A bill may be presented as a way to bring order to college sports, but parents should ask: Order for whom? If schools, conferences and administrators gain certainty by limiting athletes’ choices, that is not balance. If athletes are asked to accept new restrictions without an independent voice or a way to negotiate the terms, that is not a durable solution.

Our children should not pay for instability they did not create. Real stability requires clear, enforceable rules developed with athletes. It means standard contracts, meaningful health and safety protections, fair processes for eligibility and transfers and accountability when promises are broken. Most importantly, it means athletes have independent representation when those terms are negotiated.

Trust Should Not Require Silence

Parents are often told to trust the process. Trust the coaches. Trust the school. Trust the administrators. But trust should not require silence. Asking questions does not mean we want to make every decision for our college-aged children. Quite the opposite. Our children are becoming adults. They should have more control over their futures, not less.

Our role is to make sure they have the information, rights and support needed to make those decisions for themselves. That is why I believe athletes need independent representation and why I am proud to be part of the Athletes.org parents community.

Our Children Must Be Part of What Comes Next

I don’t pretend to have every answer for what college sports should look like five or ten years from now. But I know what I want for my child. I want them to receive a great education. I want them to be healthy and safe. I want them to be treated fairly. I want schools to honor their commitments. I want rules to be clear and consistently applied. I want my child to have choices and a meaningful say in the decisions that shape their college career. None of that should be controversial.

For years, parents largely watched college sports from the sidelines. We cheered from the stands. We drove to games. We helped our children through injuries, transfers, academic challenges and the emotional highs and lows of competing in college. The sidelines are no longer enough.

Decisions being made in Washington and across college athletics will shape our children’s lives. Parents need to be part of that conversation, not because we want to run college sports or make decisions for athletes, but because we know what our children sacrificed to get here. They deserve a system that respects that sacrifice.

Politics is now part of college sports. Parents have a responsibility to pay attention. When our children are excluded from decisions about their own futures, we have a responsibility to speak up. Athletes have worked too hard and given too much to become another piece of a political or institutional deal. They deserve a real voice in writing the rules that govern them. Parents should insist on nothing less.

Steve Evans
Father of Ky Evans, Minnesota men’s basketball