KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The MIAA has announced a new initiative through its Empower U partnership with Seigfreid Bingham that will provide a variety of NIL-related resources for MIAA student-athletes. The new education, compliance resources, and documents contain business and legal guidance for MIAA student-athletes in a variety of NIL opportunities.

The "Empower U" initiative is a name, image and likeness (NIL) service developed by Seigfreid Bingham. The service is designed to aid conferences and institutions (primarily organizations/institutions with smaller staffs and limited compliance resources) in navigating NCAA NIL policy guidance and various NIL state laws regulating student-athlete name, image, and likeness activities. Empower U offers NIL assistance through two service pillars — the first pillar is education and compliance assistance to conferences and institutions; the second pillar features direct education and guidance to a student-athlete on business, insurance, tax, and related financial/legal issues for a specific NIL opportunity.

“In Division II, many NIL opportunities require student-athletes to initiate these business activities on their own,” said MIAA Commissioner Mike Racy. “These new business and legal resources will provide MIAA students an advantage in how to set up a camp, clinic, private lessons, speaking engagement, and other NIL-related entrepreneurial activities.”

As part of the new program, Empower U has created a repository of NIL resources that will cover topics such as:

• The use of an NIL Agent and Legal Representation as a student-athlete, what the benefits would be, how an agent should be selected, and what to include in an agent contract.
• NIL Tax Considerations including how to file a tax return, what to account for, and deciding if someone is eligible to deduct NIL-related expenses.
• Entity Selection and Criteria for creating an NIL business, how to do so, and what to do once the business has been formed.
• Operating Agreement Considerations for an LLC to help walk the student-athlete through the process.
• Access to NIL Contract Best Practices and Recommended Provisions that cover possible NIL-related provisions, potential services that will be provided by the student-athlete, and comments/recommendations to understanding the NCAA language.
• Insight into FAQs for Running a Sports Camp/Lessons, what the legal risks might be, how to mitigate those risks, and certain responsibilities the athlete would need to consider. In addition to that, one would also have access to a sample Waiver and Consent Form to provide in those situations.

This program has been led by Seigfreid Bingham attorneys Greg Whiston and Tate Thompson, who pilot the Empower U partnership with the MIAA.
 
“When we developed the Empower U program our goal was to help the MIAA and other conference clients empower their student-athletes in this new era of NIL," said Greg Whiston of Seigfreid Bingham. "We feel that the resources made available to student-athletes through our newest program will do just that and give student-athletes key resources to help them tap into NIL opportunities in an informed and business-like manner."
 
The resources will be housed on the MIAA webpage underneath "NIL Resources". That page can be found here.