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At the convention, Fiala, Granger and
Bell met with other Power 5 conferences’
student-athlete representatives to get their
perspectives and then ultimately to convey a
consensus to NCAA officials. When it came to
voting on legislation, the 80-member panel
consisted of 15 student-athlete representatives
from the Power 5 conferences—the largest
bloc of the voters.
“That’s just as much as any conference
had,” Fiala said. “The ACC is the largest
conference in terms of the number of schools.
They had 15, and student-athletes had 15. So
the student-athlete bloc of voting is just as
powerful as the ACC’s. It’s kind of unique to
see that. That’s something I wouldn’t have
realized without being a part of it.”
Most of the legislation centered on the
time demands of student-athletes. Examples
of legislation that passed included giving
student-athletes an additional 14 days
off, banning athletics activities other than
competition over an eight-hour period (for
example, 9 p.m. until 6 a.m.), and requiring
a seven-day break without athletics activities
once a team’s season ends.
The student-athlete representatives didn’t
always agree on matters. An amendment
to allow participation in life-skill activities,
such as community service events, on days
off passed—but there wasn’t a consensus on
this topic.
“There were people that, based on principle,
didn’t want anything to be allowed on days
off,” Fiala said. “ACC student-athletes felt
differently. A lot of us felt that you should be
able to do things that would be beneficial to you
as a person, so life skills events and stuff like
that because that’s not really, to us, athletic-
related. That’s more you growing as a person.
“So the things we do for the One Love
Foundation [a foundation that raises
awareness of abuse], for example, those are
allowed on your days off. But that issue was
Continued on page 44
Brandon Fiala
owns three school
records and has
won five ACC
gold medals in
his career, but his
work outside of the
pool has been just
as important.