Florida State is not the first major college program to announce its own initiative to help their athletes capitalize on the coming name, image and likeness era. Texas has LEVERAGE, USC has The Blvd, and way back on March 10, 2020, Nebraska launched its Ready Now Program, among others. The Seminoles are far from the first in that respect.
But what makes Florida State's pitch different is its certainty.
Other programs could build all the PowerPoint decks and trot in as many local celebrities as they wanted, but the subtext of each announcement was the same: We can't tell you exactly when all this is coming, but it'll be soon! We hope!
Not so at Florida State. Florida's first-in-the-nation NIL bill goes into effect on July 1, after which point it will be a violation of state law to prevent a Sunshine State college athlete from capitalizing on their notoriety as a college athlete.
That July 1 date has been set as something of a soft deadline for the NCAA -- with the help of Congress, they hope -- to hammer out a national policy, but Florida schools have no such worries.
And in that certainty, Apex is born.
Beyond that, Florida State's plan will also offer two for-credit NIL classes developed with the help of FSU's College of Business and its Academic Center for Excellence.
The two for-credit courses and the NIL education provided will lay out a road map to professional drafts, Olympic sports, graduate school, the workforce and entrepreneurism. It will facilitate student-athletes starting to build a foundation for NIL success as a freshman. Juniors and seniors will then enroll in a second credit course that will examine social media brand building, brand management, social analytics and platform best practices.
"Florida's Intercollegiate Athlete Compensation and Rights bill goes into effect July 1, and from day one, we will be ready to assist our student-athletes in pursuing all the rights provided to them under the law," Seminoles AD David Coburn said. "Apex is structured to allow student-athletes to maximize their NIL potential while in college and help them graduate with less debt, assist their families and prepare for the next chapter in their lives."
And it all begins in earnest (checks calendar) roughly two and a half months from today.