The move will disrupt a textbook publishing industry that has been charging students exorbitant fees without any checks and balances.
Hackney Publications announced today that it has published a free textbook for instructors who teach sports law at the undergraduate level.
The text, Sports Law Basics, is meant to accomplish two things, according to Holt Hackney, the CEO of Hackney Publications.
First, it is meant to give professors a current, comprehensive option that is created the same year as its release, and every year thereafter. Sports Law Basics, which is 120 pages and edited by Hackney Publications Legal Editor Anna Giambelluca, taps into the nation’s largest sports-law specific archive, which is housed by Hackney Publications, of more than 6,000 case summaries and articles.
Second, and perhaps most important, Sports Law Basics is free to professors, whose libraries already subscribe to Sports Litigation Alert, or who participate in the classroom program, where students pay only $15 for semester subscriptions. For a limited time, HP will also provide the textbook for free to members of the Sports and Recreation Law Association, upon renewal of their membership, or the initiation of a new membership.
“We have been providing the Alert to higher education for more than 20 years,” said Hackney. “Professors are using the Alert in a myriad of creative ways with students. In combination with Sports Law Basics, we are providing everything a professor needs to cost-effectively teach sports law to college students.
“Importantly, we are also giving department heads a way to demonstrate to their superiors that they have the best interests of students at heart and that they are responding to concerns about the rising cost of textbooks.”
Hackney went on to note that the option for libraries to subscribe is less than $500 annually, which is “far less expensive than other subscription options for sports-related periodicals. As for the other option of students subscribing for $15, that is a modest sum next to what students are paying for textbooks.”
The textbook includes the following chapters:
Part I: Foundations of Sports Law
Introduction to Sports Law
Foundations of Law
Governance of Sports Organizations
Part II: Core Legal Principles
Contracts in Sports
Torts and Athlete Injuries
Labor and Employment in Sports
Part III: The Business of Sports
Athlete Representation and Agents
Name, Image, and Likeness
Intellectual Property in Sports
Media Rights and Broadcasting
Antitrust and the Business of Sports
Part IV: Competition and Integrity
Drug Testing and Performance Enhancements
Gambling and Sports Integrity
Part V: Equality in Sports
Race and Discrimination in Sports
Title IX and Gender Equity
Existing subscribers that want to access the textbook should reach out to HP at hhackney@hackneypublications.com.
Those who want to take a library subscriptions can email HP at the above address or work through their subscription service partner. Typically, HP has a partnership with major subscription service partners.
Professors can sign up for the classroom program here: https://sportslitigationalert.com/free-subscription-for-sports-law-professors/
The textbook has been a year in the making, already earning praise in the industry, including the following:
“I will adopt this. Combined with Sports Litigation Alert, my course notes and PowerPoints, it paints the full picture without a cumbersome text, which frankly students aren’t reading,” said Emily M. Must, Faculty and Director of Internships at the Mark H. McCormack Department of Sport Management and Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
“Having used the Sports Litigation Alert in my courses for several years, this textbook is a perfect complement for teaching the fundamentals of sport law. The focused format allows students to quickly grasp a foundational understanding of topics relevant to any career path in sport, and then examine how those legal principles have been interpreted and applied in case studies of both landmark and recent cases. Hackney Publications and its team have given professors yet another excellent tool to make concepts come alive in our sport law courses,” Mike Ross, Ed.D., Associate Dean / College of Education, Associate Professor / Dept. of Sport & Leadership Studies, at Wichita State University.
“The textbook is laid out well and the writing is concise. It is definitely something undergrads would be expected to cover in a semester,” said Bobby Bramwell, University of Tennessee Law School Professor.
About Hackney Publications
Hackney Publications (www.hackneypublications.com) is the nation’s leading publisher of sports law periodicals. The company was founded by journalist Holt Hackney. Hackney began his career as a sportswriter, before taking on the then-nascent sports business beat at Financial World Magazine in the late 1980s. A few years later, Hackney started writing about the law, managing five legal newsletters for LRP Publications. In 1999, he founded Hackney Publications. Today, Hackney publishes or co-publishes 26 sports law periodicals, including Sports Litigation Alert (www.sportslitigationalert.com), which publishes 24 times a year and features a searchable archive of approximately 6,000 articles and case summaries.
Not surprisingly, the Alert is used in more than 100 sports law classrooms any given semester, preparing students destined for a career in the sports industry, as well as the next generation of sports lawyers.