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Wednesday, Aug. 19; 2015
NEWS | KANSAN.COM
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More students prefer parents' healthcare plans than KU's
CHANDLER BOESE
@Chandler_Boese
University of Kansas students $ ^{*} $ enrolled in student healthcare package
*Total of 2,815 students
In the year since the Affordable Care Act was implemented at the University, 32 student employees have qualified for healthcare plans. This means that they qualify for the plan offered to all state employees, said Ola Faucher, director of Human Resources.
The reason for this may be that the student health insurance plans are sufficient enough for many students, Faucher said. However, some students may choose to stay on their parents'plans rather than look into employee or student plans.
The student healthcare package, which international students are required to purchase and graduate student employees are offered at a discount, is offered to all college students in Kansas through the Board of Regents. For an annual plan not including dependents, a student would pay $1,489.
Source; Kansas Board of Regents
Of these 32, two have opted to enroll in the plan.
At the end of May, 2,815 University students were enrolled in the student healthcare package, according to information provided by Breeze Richardson, director of communications for the Kansas Board of Regents. Of those, 1,344 were international students required to purchase the plan and 994 were graduate students, whose premiums are covered up to 75 percent by the University. That means 477 domestic undergraduates were enrolled in the plan.
As of May 2014, 2,731 students were enrolled in the plan, including 938 graduate students, Richardson said. At that time, domestic and international undergraduates were not broken up in reporting, but a total of 1,793 undergraduates were enrolled.
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Richardson said that any change in the numbers could not be exclusively attributed to ACA. Another provision of ACA dictates that young adults can stay on a parent's plan until they turn 26 years old.
"I may have been offered it when I was hired on at the library a year ago, but my dad's ex-military, so I do healthcare through the government that way," Cox said. "I just chose to do it that way because it was going to be more affordable for me, since I pay for my own stuff. I get that until I'm 26 as long as I'm enrolled in school."
Michael Cox, a sophomore from Augusta, works at the Anschutz Library circulation desk. He said he wasn't sure whether the University had offered him health care because he knew he already had health insurance.
no idea whether she'd been offered health care, but she knew she didn't take it.
Emma Bean, a junior from Colorado Springs, Colo., agreed. Bean, who works at the College' of Liberal Arts and Science's reception desk in Strong Hall, said she had
"It honestly never occurred to me to look at what the University was offering me," Bean said. "I've just been on my mom's plan forever, so it was just so much easier."
Under ACA, this may hold true for many undergraduates. ACA states that if an insurance plan covers children, it will cover them until they turn 26 years old. According to the University's Office of Institutional Research and Planning, only 1,471 undergraduates, or 7.8 percent, were 26 or older in the fall.
der ACA.
Although not all undergraduates, even if they are 26 or younger, are eligible to be covered under a parental plan, many now have the option un-
In an effort to implement the ACA and minimize costs to the University, Human Resources set hour restrictions for students. Each on-campus undergraduate employee will only be allowed to 20 hours per week during the school year and 40 hours per week in the summer.
Faucher said the limits were because of the University's implementation of ACA. Any employee working more than 30 hours over an extended period of time should be offered benefits by his or her employer, according to one provision of ACA.
In the coming year, Faucher said these restrictions will be more strictly enforced.
KU Student Expenses
Total expenses - $4,116
Books - $1,040
Transportation - $1,906
Personal expenses - $1,170, including All Sports Combo ($175) and parking pass.
($260 for the year or $150 for a semester)
Source: Financial Aid and Scholarships
Expenses for first-year students are inevitable, but planning and being conscious of spending can help students adjust to the costs of college living.
Planning can help students save money
First-year students at KU can expect to spend around $4,116 per year not including room and board, tuition and required campus fees, according to Financial Aid and Scholarships.
The University advises students to budget $1,040 on books, $1,906 for transportation and $1,170 for personal expenses each year, which includes furnishing a dorm, a parking pass and the all sports combo in addition to other small expenses.
CASSIDY RITTER
@CassidyRitter
Students and faculty can book one-on-one appointments with Student Money Management Services, a free service the University offers to help with budgeting, to help save money. The office also provides workshops.
Student Money Management Services focus on five pillars of student finance: income and financial aid, checking and savings, cash management, credit cards and credit history. Those who work in SMMS use the pillars during one-on-one appointments to help the student or faculty member understand how and where to spend money.
Jeffrey Heppler, a fifth-year senior from Kansas City,
Kan., who works at Money Management Services, advises first-year students to be conscious of spending money and going out. This means budgeting how much money to spend when going out to eat and attending other social activities.
"We encourage students to use their meal plans because they have already paid for that," Heppler said.
When scheduling an appointment with SMMS, the student will sit down with a financial advisor to look over the students inflow and outflow then compare the two, said Heppler. SMMS uses the two to create a budget for the student.
Another resource advised by Student Money Management Services is Cash Course, an online money guide helping students with finances and assignments by providing financial tools and advice. With a free account, students can access financial tools, like a budget wizard or financial calculator along with financial videos and glossaries. Students also find advice on the "Financial Expert's Wall", which answers popular questions about budgeting, credit, identity theft, savings and student loans.
Student Money Management Services is located on the third level of the Kansas Union, or students can email a financial expert with specific questions about budgeting.
Board blocks effort to unionize college athletes
JEFFREY PHELPS/KANSAN
Northwestern football players at practice. The National Labor Relations Board on Monday overturned a historic ruling that gave Northwestern University football players the go-ahead to form the nation's first college athletes' union, saying the prospect of union and non-union teams could throw off the competitive balance in college football.
MICHAEL TARM Associated Press
CHICAGO — The National Labor Relations Board on Monday blocked a historic bid by Northwestern University football players to form the nation's first college athletes' union, dealing a blow to a labor movement that could have transformed amateur sports.
In a unanimous decision, the board said the prospect of union and nonunion teams in college could lead to different standards at different schools
— from how much money players receive to how much time they practice — and create competitive imbalances on the field.
The new ruling annuls a 2014 decision by a regional NLRB director in Chicago who said scholarship football players are employees under U.S. law and thus entitled to organize. But Monday's decision did not directly address the question of whether the players are employees.
"This puts the nail in the coffin of organizing college players," said Ronald Meisburg, a former attorney for the NLRB and onetime board member.
Some observers said the ruling effectively ends any chance to establish labor unions in college athletics.
Tim Waters, of the United Steelworkers union, which helped bankroll the union drive, disagreed.
The face of the union-building effort, former Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter, also expressed disappointment. But he said the push for unionization had already pressured the NCAA to take athletes' grievances more seriously.
"It is a bump in the road," Waters said.
The labor dispute goes to the heart of American college sports, where universities and conferences reap billions of dollars by relying on amateurs who are not paid. In other countries, college sports are small-time club affairs, while elite youth athletes often turn pro as teens.
"It turned out to be the right thing to do, and I don't regret it." Colter said.
The biggest factor in how it ruled, the board said, was the NLRB's jurisdiction, which extends only to private schools like Northwestern, the sole private institution in the Big Ten.
NLRB rules do not offer the losing side the option to appeal. But Ramogi Huma, a former linebacker at UCLA who worked closely with Colter, said he has not given up on bringing unions to college football.
The board repeatedly cited the need for standardization of rules and policies in sports and said giving the green light to just one team to collectively bargain would disrupt that uniformity.
The board seemed to leave open the possibly of taking up the unionization issue again if it involved other schools or if conditions change for Northwestern football.
"The door's not closed," he said.
But Meisburg said the way
Northwestern became the focal point of the labor fight in January 2014, when Colter announced plans to form the first U.S. labor union for college athletes. He appeared at a news conference for the College Athletes Players Association.
the ruling highlights the challenges of organizing sports at private and state schools means the board is unlikely to consider another union petition from a college team.
"I don't see those institutional problems going away," Meisburg said.
Three months later, regional NLRB Director Peter Sung Ohr issued his decision, saying Northwestern football players should be able to unionize. A month later, players cast secret
ballots on whether to unionize. Those ballots were sealed during the appeal and will now be destroyed without being counted.
While NLRB decisions sometimes split along party lines, the three Democrats and two Republicans on the board all agreed.
Under U.S. law, an employee is regarded as someone who receives compensation for a service and is under the direct control of managers. In Northwestern's case, Ohr concluded coaches are the equivalent of business managers and scholarships are a form of pay.
On Monday, Waters criticized the NLRB for sidestepping the most sensitive question: Are scholarship players employees?
The board's decision was welcomed by the NCAA, which has been fighting lawsuits from former athletes over everything from head injuries to revenue earned from their likenesses in video games.
Northwestern's vice president for university relations, Alan Cubbage, also welcomed the ruling. And he applauded pro-union players "for bringing national attention to these important issues."
"It's like they had a hot potato tossed into their laps, and they took a year and a half of deliberations and said, 'We're going to toss it back,'" he said.
The NCAA recently cleared the way for the five biggest conferences, including the Big Ten, to add player stipends to help athletes defray some of their expenses.
"This ruling allows us to continue to make progress ... without risking the instability to college sports that the NLRB recognized might occur," it said.
Northwestern, the Big Ten and the NCAA all argued against the unionization effort, saying that lumping college athletes into the same category as factory workers would change amateur athletics for the worse.
In a statement, the Indianapolis-based NCAA portrayed the board's ruling as recognition that it's trying to improve conditions for athletes.
The specific goals of prounion players included guaranteeing coverage of sports-related medical expenses for current and former players and reducing head injuries.
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