Dartmouth Basketball Team Votes to Unionize

In a historic move that could alter college athletics, the Dartmouth men's basketball team voted 13-2 on Tuesday in favor of forming a union, The Athletic reported.

Dartmouth players filed a petition in September with the National Labor Relations Board to unionize through the Service Employees International Union, Local 560. The election took place on the campus in Hanover, New Hampshire, where the university is expected to request a review by the NLRB and will likely file an appeal to federal court.

The appeals process is expected to delay official recognition and any collective bargaining by several months.

NLRB Regional Director Laura Sacks ruled that the players are employees and could unionize.

"Because Dartmouth has the right to control the work performed by the Dartmouth men's basketball team, and the players perform that work in exchange for compensation, I find that the petitioned-for basketball players are employees within the meaning of the Act," Sacks wrote.

In a statement Tuesday, Dartmouth disagreed with players being classified as employees.

"For Ivy League students who are varsity athletes, academics are of primary importance, and athletic pursuit is part of the educational experience," the statement said, according to ESPN. "Classifying these students as employees simply because they play basketball is as unprecedented as it is inaccurate."

Although other college sports teams have attempted similar measures in the past, such as Northwestern in 2014, none has made it as far as Dartmouth due to it being in the all-private Ivy League.

Northwestern is a member of the Big Ten Conference, which is comprised primarily of state schools. The NLRB ruled it could not assert jurisdiction due to the varying state labor laws. 

Dartmouth is likely the first of many such cases to come before the NLRB this year. A similar complaint was brought against USC, the Pac-12 and the NCAA, arguing that USC's "student-athletes" should be classified as employees, partly due to the massive amounts of revenue sports bring to universities.

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