Good morning, and thanks for spending part of your day with Extra Points.
As of this morning, I’m somewhere between Rapid City, South Dakota, and Uinta County, Wyoming. I’ll return to Chicago next week.
We’ve got some great freelance voices to highlight this week while I’m gone. But before we get to those stories, today, I want to mention an update from the European Union that might have flown under your radar last week:
European Athletics and the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) introduced guidelines on Tuesday aimed at preventing the sexualisation of female athletes through camera angles and the use of replays.
The guidelines follow feedback from athletes who said certain camera shots can cause discomfort and distractions by drawing attention away from their performances
You can download the full guide here. It’s 23 pages long and includes lots of practical guidance on what types of shots to avoid and where cameras should be placed across various sports. Here’s an example:
What I love about this report isn’t just that it provides specific, actionable examples of camera shots to avoid (even when the intent from the broadcast isn’t to sexualize an athlete); it also provides concrete examples of positive angles, or types of photography, that could enhance a broadcast.
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For American college audiences, this could be legitimately useful, especially in Olympic sports that aren’t always televised, where operators and managers may be a little less experienced.
If you’ve never shot a pole vault event before, knowing what to shoot in order to best educate and inform your audience is important, to say nothing about framing that could make athletes uncomfortable. Many folks who are going to tune in to stream the high jump or a running event may not be familiar with the technical aspects of training and competition.
So the broadcast isn’t just about showcasing the result itself; it’s also about helping the viewer understand why something happened or why something was super cool. Professional development to better educate the production crew on how to convey those moments is worth paying attention to, in my humble opinion.
The other thing I liked about the report? It included feedback not just from professional broadcasters, but also from current and former athletes. What does a pole vaulter think would enhance a broadcast of pole vaulting? What do volleyball players like and dislike about how their sport is presented on television and streaming? How can the casual viewer better understand what is going on?
Many college sports broadcasts are self-produced, with undergraduates operating cameras, producing games and providing color commentary. Before the start of the fall season, it may not be a bad idea to revisit what sorts of training and best practices are being shared with crews who might not be avid fans of a sport … and to check in with the athletes (particularly women) to make sure they feel they’re being respectfully and professionally recorded.
Just because you’ve always done something a particular way doesn’t make it the best way, or the more moral way. Good for the EBU to give everybody who works in sports a little something to think about.
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Bad news for international college athletes
Previously, a student on an international student visa could remain in the United States until completing their degree program. Maybe that’s four years, maybe five, maybe six, depending on the student, university and degree program. But according to new guidance from the Department of Homeland Security, the new deadline is four years.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security scrapped a long-standing policy Thursday that allowed international students to stay in the U.S. until they finish their program of study. The new rule, which will be formally published Friday, will limit their stay in the U.S. to just four years unless they receive an extension, as well as limit students’ ability to change majors and institutions once in the country.
International education leaders and experts have argued that four years is not enough time for a significant number of students to complete their degree; almost all Ph.D. programs are longer than four years, while the average undergraduate takes more than four years to complete their bachelor’s degree. Additionally, students pursuing optional practical training, the work authorization for F-1 students following their graduation, typically stay in the U.S. more than four years.
But the government has argued that the old policy known as duration of status allows students to stay in the U.S. indefinitely without having to interact with immigration officials, leading to overstays and national security concerns.
This rule change is significant for tuition-dependent smaller colleges, which may rely on international student enrollment (and their typically higher tuition bills) to stay open. But a hard limit of four years and limitations around transferring could also impact college sports.
I don’t imagine this would be as big of an issue in college football (where international student enrollment is relatively low) or with high-profile men’s basketball and hockey (where elite international athletes often pursue professional opportunities before the full four years) — but in sports like golf, tennis, soccer, field hockey, and swimming, the new DHS guidelines, if implemented, could really throw a wrench into roster management.
The rule is scheduled to be implemented on September 15, several weeks after the start of the 2026 fall athletic season. So just in case your compliance department didn’t have enough to worry about right now …
