LANSING, Mich. – Michigan lawmakers want the state’s college student athletes to focus on academics, rather than their employment and collective bargaining while attending school.

The legislature approved a measure earlier this month to make it illegal for student athletes at public universities and colleges to join a labor union, and Gov. Rick Snyder approved the new law this week, Mlive.com reports.

The law, known as Public Act 414, “excludes college athletes from the definition of ‘public employees’ who are entitled to collectively bargain,” according to a press release from the governor cited by Mlive.

MORE NEWS: Know These Before Moving From Cyprus To The UK

“The bill would ensure that college athletes are students, first and foremost, and should not be treated as employees by their school.”

PA 414 comes after football players at Northwestern University, a private college, took a vote in April on whether to unionize, although the votes were impounded until the National Labor Relations Board issues a ruling, the New York Times reports.

Since that time, the NCAA has overhauled its governance structure, universities have their scholarship and health care programs, and a federal judge ruled in August that players can be paid for the use of their names and images in video games and television broadcasts, according to the Times.

Critics of PA 414 contend the new law is unnecessary, because there have not been any talks of unionization at any of the state’s public colleges or universities.

“The timing of the announcement came at the same time the University of Michigan was introducing Jim Harbaugh as its new head football coach in a press conference in Ann Arbor,” Mlive reports.

“Previous coach Brady Hoke said the school’s football program encouraged its players to ‘educate themselves’ on unionization, but there was never any further talk of unionization from the Wolverines.”

MORE NEWS: How to prepare for face-to-face classes

“College football continues its track of involving,” Hoke told Mlive in April. “It’s (very) complicated, for me at least, I’ll say that. You’re trying to educate yourself about what this means. What it doesn’t mean. The political process. What’s part of it.

“We encourage our kids to educate themselves on this, and we’ll help educate them. We talked about it with them once before spring (practice began).”

College Athletes Players Association president Ramogi Huma and former Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter went to Washington D.C. in March to plead their case for unionizing college athletes.

“We want them to understand why we’re doing what we’re doing,” Huma told ESPN. “Obviously, Congress has the power to affect conditions for college athletes as well, and we want to correct some of the false statements that have been made about what we’re trying to do.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada whose son played soccer for the University of Virginia, told The Washington Post he’ll “do anything” he can to help the unionization effort, according to ESPN.

“Of course they should be able to organize,” Reid said. “The way these people are treated by the NCAA and the universities themselves is really unpardonable, and I wish them well.”

Tennessee U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander had a vastly different take on the situation.

“Imagine a university’s basketball players striking before a Sweet 16 game demanding shorter practices, bigger dorm rooms, better food and no classes before 11 a.m.,” he said, according to ESPN.