Sports fans can hear some of the top sports figures in the country speak for free at the Packers' and St. Norbert College's Sport and Society Conference, Tuesday, May 24, through Wednesday, May 25. Certain sessions are free, with no tickets required.
The conference will focus on the business of college sports, with the below sessions free and open to the public:
- Keynote address:Wisconsin Badgers athletics director Barry Alvarez will talk on "Building a Winner" Tuesday, May 24, at 9 a.m. in the Walter Theatre, Abbot Pennings Hall of Fine Arts on the St. Norbert College campus.
- Panel discussion:There will be a sports panel discussion about the amateur athlete experience on Wednesday, May 25, from 9:30 to 11 a.m. in the Legends Club Room at Lambeau Field. The panel will feature Darren Rovell, sports business analyst for ESPN; former Packers player and current CBS college football analyst Aaron Taylor; and Niagara,Wis., native and former WNBA All-Star Anna De Forge. The panel will be moderated by Kevin Quinn, dean of the Donald J. Schneider School of Business & Economics.
- Keynote address:Sports labor attorney Jeffrey Kessler will speak on Wednesday, May 25, from 11:15 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. in the Legends Club Room at Lambeau Field. His talk is titled "Let Them Eat Pizza: The NCAA's Ban on Permitting Conferences and Schools to Decide for Themselves Whether and How to Compensate the Division I Athletes Who Generate Hundreds of Millions for Their Institutions." Kessler is one of the most prominent lawyers in the country regularly engaged in high-profile sports litigation. He represented a class of college football and basketball players in antitrust litigation to strike down anti-competitive NCAA rules.
This is the fourth conference of its kind put on by St. Norbert College and the Green Bay Packers, with the first conference held in 2010. This partnership between an NFL team and an institution of higher education brings together academics and business professionals from around the country.
The Packers have held their summer training camp at St. Norbert College for 58 years, the longest such relationship between a pro football team and a college in the NFL.
For more conference information, please visit http://www.snc.edu/sportandsociety/schedule.html, or contact Karen Cleereman, conference administrative coordinator, at sportandsociety@snc.edu or 920-403-3777.
