Several area ADs vote in favor of NIL

Last April, when the WIAA first broached the subject of including name, image and likeness (NIL) language into its constitution for student athletes, the measure failed on a vote of its membership by 49 votes. 

That same measure was approved by a 293-107 margin last week during the WIAA’s annual meeting in Stevens Point. More than 100 school delegates who voted against NIL last spring changed their minds this year — and some of the votes that flipped came from the Northwoods.

Rhinelander activities director Brian Paulson and Tomahawk activities director Ryan Flynn both told the River News that they voted to support the WIAA’s NIL language this time around after voting against it a year ago.

The language allows student-athletes to profit from their name, image and likeness — provided that their high school, conference and the WIAA are not associated with NIL endeavors and that the products or services promoted do not run against WIAA regulations against promoting products not suited for minors. 

The language also attempts to put in guardrails that prevent NIL from being used as a means to lure student-athletes away from one school to play for another, as had been a recurring issue over the past few years at the collegiate level.

Paulson said two primary factors ultimately led him to flip his vote — having an additional year to gather information on the topic, and the inevitable sense that NIL trickling down to the high school level was only a matter of time.

“Last year as the activities director, we decided to vote no because we really didn’t have enough information on it, regarding the topic,” he said. “When more education came out, and the possibility of state legislation writing (a law mandating NIL), I think that helped us understand that we need to get ahead of the game here. That’s what the WIAA message has been, is we need to stay ahead of these things before it could turn out different.”

That was a sentiment shared by Lakeland Union AD Emily Wizner, who said she voted for NIL both last year and this year. 

“I knew it was forthcoming ... I still think there’s a lot of education that we need to have with our parents, students, just community members because I think that people think that it’s very similar to the NCAA, which it’s not,” she said. “I think it was like a premature vote last year. I don’t think enough ADs knew what the actual language was going to be like.”

“Wisconsin’s one of the more than 40 states that have some type of language that allows students to enter into NIL,” she added regarding her yes vote this year. “I trusted the association’s guidance and education that they gave us leading up to the meeting. They put on a lot of different webinars and communication leading up to the meeting.”

The amendment 

    The above infographic from Influential Athlete, and provided by the WIAA to its member schools, outlines name, image and likeness (NIL) language that will go into effect for Wisconsin student-athletes later this month. NIL came as the result of a 293-108 vote by member schools in support of the measure during the WIAA’s annual meeting held April 24, 2025 in Stevens Point. (Submitted image)
  

The NIL language, which goes into effect later this month with the publication of the next edition of the “WIAA Bulletin” newsletter, adds NIL opportunities as an exemption to prohibited activities that would otherwise compromise a student-athlete’s amateur status, as outlined in Article IV of the WIAA Constitution. 

While Article IV, Section 1-C states “an athlete forfeits amateur status in a sport by capitalizing on athletic fame by receiving money, compensation, endorsements or gifts of monetary value in affiliation or connection with activities involving the student’s school team, school, Conference or WIAA.” Item 1 in the amended constitution expressly states the provision is not intended to restrict a student’s NIL opportunities, so long those opportunities are not affiliated with the student’s school team, which school, conference or the WIAA. 

Item 2 goes on to further outline NIL activities that are prohibited by the WIAA, such as promoting products not permitted by the association  — including those associated with gambling, adult entertainment, weapons, alcohol, tobacco, cannabis or other banned or illegal substances — or having NIL compensation based on specific athletic achievement (i.e. financial incentives based on points scored). 

Furthermore, compensation may not be provided by a school, or persons associated with a school, as a means to either recruit an athlete to transfer to that school, or remain enrolled in their current school. Additionally, NIL activities shall not interfere with a student-athletes academic obligations or its involvement with his or her school team (i.e. missing practices or games in order to participate in NIL activities). 

Students are also prohibited from hiring an agent to represent them for NIL activities.

“You look at NIL right now and how it presented like I think it’s actually going to go pretty well,” Flynn said. “It’s very manageable. It doesn’t really change a whole lot of what was already going on, besides, it does give kids opportunities now, based on name, image and likeness be involved.”

“A lot of people think it’s going be like college, but I would say that (for) high schoolers, schools are still non-profit,” Paulson added. “They can’t get money and then pay players. That’s not how that’s going to work, but students will be allowed to sell their own pictures that are not with their local school colors, sign autographs. They would be able to do camps. It will look different than college.”

Getting ahead of the game

Upon the membership voting down NIL language in 2024, WIAA executive director Stephanie Hauser stated in her remarks, “The WIAA staff provides information, rationale and possible unintended consequences, but it’s ultimately up to each member school to determine how to cast its vote.” 

According to Paulson and Wizner, those “unintended consequences” included the worry that the state legislature may beat the WIAA to the punch and work on legislation to put NIL in state statues. The fear was that language could be far less restrictive than the WIAA’s, and the WIAA would be powerless to stop it.

“I thought that it was the direction that the state was going to go in regardless whether the WIAA put it into place or legislators,” Wizner said. “I was comfortable with the language that they had in place for the WIAA.”

“If the state legislation writes the law, like they did the homeschool law, you aren’t changing how it’s written,” Paulson added, referencing a law passed in 2013 which allows home-schooled students to participate in extra-curricular activities on the same basis as public school athletes in the district in which they reside. “By the WIAA, and their membership, writing the rules, those can adapt and change. That’s a big difference in my opinion.” 

Paulson conceded while there’s always the possibility that lawmakers could still step in to overwrite the WIAA’s NIL rules, getting something on the WIAA books preemptively could lessen the motivation to do so.

“We feel like because we took action on it, looked deep into it and didn’t leave it for something to ignore that we feel better that we would have the opportunity to control the narrative,” he said.

Education and enforcement

In an April 2024 interview with FOX-6 in Milwaukee, Hauser conceded that much of the weight in terms of educating students and parents, and subsequently ensuring compliance, on the new NIL language will ultimately fall on administrators at each school.

“Often we’re compared to the NCAA, but the WIAA does not have an eligibility or an investigative branch,” she said. “So no, the school themselves will be the ones to educate the parents and the student-athletes and then to address any potential eligibility issues.”

Flynn said that’s something that already falls on his shoulders and an issue he has had to deal with a couple of times already this school year with businesses wanting to offer goods or services to teams for achievements at the state level.

“(I had to) just be like, ‘Hey guys, you’re still amateurs. The community’s very proud of you. They’re excited for you, but don’t take free services. You’ll lose your amateur status,’” he said. “And all the kids are like, ‘Oh, yeah, that makes sense. Thanks for the head’s up, Flynn.’”

All the ADs contacted by the River News said educating student-athletes and their parents and/or guardians regarding the potential benefits and pitfalls of NIL will be a major point of emphasis moving forward. 

“I think that our students and community will have to be more educated on the topic to be able to know what the new things are coming and what can and cannot happen based on name, image and likeness,” Paulson said. “A lot of this is going to be a learning process for a lot of us. Even with the current WIAA rules, and how things are stated, we are always double-checking, questioning ourselves to be sure that we’re accurate on everything that we’re trying to do.”

Wizner said she’s already had people reach out to her about the new NIL language and noted NIL will be a topic of conversation at an upcoming meeting of Great Northern Conference ADs.

“The WIAA partnered with a company ... the Influential Athlete,” she said. “They partnered with them, and I know that conferences across the state are doing professional development and trainings with not only the ADs on how to handle it, but also the parents and the students, and I could see that potentially being something that the GNC looks at just to make sure that one, the students are doing it correctly, and that we’re helping like guiding them in situations that come up. We are not the ones obviously that are soliciting those, I guess, deals with them, but making sure that they’re in compliance with amateur status and stuff like that from like a WIAA standpoint.”

Other items

Apart from NIL, possibly the biggest change to come from the WIAA Annual Meeting was the adoption of more uniform summer contact periods for sports in the state. 

Coaches are now allowed unlimited contact with student-athletes between June 1 and July 31 — with the exception of July 1-6 — provided that the contact is voluntary. Football programs must still observe a nine-day dead period prior to the start of fall camp. That runs from July 27 through Aug. 4 for 11-player teams this summer. Previously, coaches in most sports were permitted only five days of contact during the summer.

Paulson said the change serves to level the playing field for smaller, more rural schools, where student-athletes are less likely to receive coaching from outside clubs or sources in the summer.

“We don’t have all those opportunities for our kids. So who are the experts in our area? There’s a few experts out there, and then we would expect our coaches to be expert in their field of coaching,” he said. “Now the expert can work with the kids more. So now it kind of give us a level playing field with some of those more populated areas that have coaches that are coaching you know during the summer at a high level.”

Flynn noted the biggest challenge for area schools will be to work with their coaches to ensure student-athletes have access to additional coaching in the summer, while not over-burdening athletes who participate in multiple sports. 

“It’s a lot in perspective, working with coaching staffs making sure it’s even, everybody getting one night,” he said. “Maybe continue to have the open gyms and let the kids choose on what they go to. Because, at the end of the day, the kids that want to be at the stuff are going to go anyways.”

The membership voted down an amendment that would have excluded cross country from sports subject to the WIAA’s performance factor. Currently only track and field and swimming — the two sports that do not have a direct team component for qualifying for the WIAA state championships — are exempt from the performance factor. Those in favor argued that the performance factor created a scenario where coaches who oversee both a school’s boys’ and girls’ programs may have to attend different sectionals meets if one of their programs has been promoted. The measure failed on a 161-241 vote. 

“Around 70% of the association voted to have a competitive balance,” Paulson said, noting the 2023 vote by the membership that established the performance factor to promote teams that achieve state-level success over the course of multiple years to a higher division than their enrollment. “Now if you allow this (coaches) association to come in and start directing this team sport in my opinion, what’s going to happen with the next team sport? And the next team sport?”

That’s a topic Flynn is very familiar with, as Tomahawk recently lost its appeal to have its boys’ hockey team remain in Division 2 for the 2025-26 season after it reached the performance factor threshold of six points over a three-year period to be promoted to Division 1. Tomahawk reached the threshold by virtue of its state tournament appearance in 2024 and its state championship this past March.

“Essentially, I was told by the (competitive balance) committee that unless there’s an extenuating circumstance with these appeals for your school, your success factor’s really what they’re going to go by that. Part of that is the plan was voted on by the membership. That’s what the membership wanted. That’s what they agreed on, so that’s what they’re going to do.”

On the topic of fan behavior, membership overwhelmingly passed an amendment that requires a spectator ejected from a contest, in addition to serving a one-game suspension, to complete the free online NFHS Sportsmanship Course available on the NFHSLearn.com website. The completed course certificate must be submitted to school officials before attending any future home athletic events.

The membership also OKed two editorial changes to the constitution that clarify existing rules and an amendment that allows ninth-grade teams to play the same number of contests as junior varsity and varsity teams.

Lakeland Times sports writer Brett LaBore contributed to this report. 

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].