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Governance in Sport: Analysis and Application
Mathew Dowling
Cocreating Change Through Sport-Based Social Entrepreneurship
Ryan Snelgrove and Laura Wood
This article describes the design of an undergraduate course in which students learn how to cocreate change using social entrepreneurship. This approach is presented as a way of broadening sport management students’ awareness of nontraditional career opportunities and facilitating an understanding of the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed as a social entrepreneur. Drawing on situational learning theory and cognitive learning theory, the course facilitates learning through student engagement in a community of practice and weekly workshops.
Sport Analytics Education for Future Executives, Managers, and Nontechnical Personnel
Liz A. Wanless and Michael Naraine
Successfully adopting sport business analytics to enhance organization-wide business processes necessitates a combination of business acumen, modeling expertise, personnel coordination, and organizational support. Although the development of technical skills has been well mapped in analytics curricula, informing future leadership and affiliated nontechnical personnel about the sport business analytics process, specifically, remains a gap in sport management curricula. This acknowledgment should compel sport management programs to explore strategies for sport analytics training geared toward this population. Guided by experiential learning and foundational business analytics frameworks, a seven-module approach to teaching sport business analytics in sport management is advanced with a particular focus for future executives, managers, and nontechnical users in the sport industry. Concomitantly, the approach presents learning goals and outcomes, sources for instructors to review and consider, and sample assessments designed to fit within the existing sport management curricula.
Mock Trial: Transforming Curriculum Through Coopetition
Leeann M. Lower-Hoppe, James O. Evans, Richard L. Bailey, and Shea M. Brgoch
Coopetition is a strategic concept that integrates elements of competition and cooperation. This strategy focuses on creating an environment where working together develops additional value for all entities involved, but there is still competition for this newly established value. Mock trial is an experiential learning technique that can serve as a platform to implement coopetitive strategies, providing students the opportunity to cooperatively apply theory to practice in a competitive courtroom simulation. This extended abstract details implementation of coopetition through mock trial for the sport management classroom. Implications for enhancing the coopetitive environment through course format, mentorship, and facilitation are also discussed.
Finding a Place Within the Academy: Sport Management and Faculty Entrepreneurship
Heather J. Lawrence, James Strode, Robert E. Baker, and Paul C. Benedict
Faculty are increasingly expected to participate in activities that bring additional revenue and prestige to their universities. Engaging in entrepreneurial activities can achieve this mission, as well as afford considerable benefits to the faculty member. This essay outlines the financial constraints that have moved universities to embrace entrepreneurship, discusses entrepreneurship in the context of sport management, outlines the benefits of pursuing entrepreneurship, describes considerations in a campus environment, and provides key considerations and a road map for navigating opportunities. The essay concludes with a call to action for sport management faculty and administrators to embrace an entrepreneurship model.
Getting an Internship in the Sport Industry: The Institutionalization of Privilege
Nefertiti A. Walker, Kwame J.A. Agyemang, Marvin Washington, Lauren C. Hindman, and Jeffrey MacCharles
Unpaid internships are embedded in sport hegemony. These unpaid sport internships often offer fewer learning opportunities and foster an environment wherein interns feel like “second-class citizens” in their organization. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the world of unpaid internships in the sport industry by exploring students’ perspectives of them as an institutionalized practice, as well as how privilege impacts their internship experiences. Grounded in institutional theory, data from semistructured interviews with 17 sports management students were analyzed using the Gioia methodology. Three themes emerged from the findings: the idiosyncratic nature of sport internships, the legitimization of unpaid internships in the sport industry, and the institutionalization of privilege spurred by such positions. Practical implications from the study include increasing sport organizations’ awareness of how unpaid internships disadvantage students from less privileged backgrounds and may, therefore, result in a less socioeconomically diverse workforce in the sport industry.
Authentic Assessment Through the Sport Management Practicum: Participants’ Perceptions of the Effectiveness of a Student-Led Sports Event
Amy K. Bermingham, Ross D. Neville, and Kyriaki Makopoulou
This study investigated perceptions about the effectiveness of a student-led sports event. Participants from a student-led tag rugby league were surveyed about its perceived effectiveness. The sample consisted of 227 participants, most of whom were undergraduates (91%) across a wide variety of academic programs. The effectiveness of the league was assessed by comparing the perceptions of participants with previous tag rugby experience with participants who had no previous tag rugby experience. Participants enjoyed participating in and reported above-average levels of commitment to the league. However, there was a difference in perceptions about the effectiveness of the league between men and women. Men with previous tag rugby experience had significantly lower perceptions about the effectiveness of the league than their counterparts with no previous experience. Post hoc analysis revealed the importance of rules and officiating protocols to men. The findings not only speak to the viability of student-led sports events but also to the utility of obtaining direct feedback from event participants themselves, which is a critical aspect of rounding out the post hoc event evaluation process. Results indicate that university course instructors should pay particular attention to knowledge of rules and officiating protocols before selecting students to deliver a league.
A Foot in the Door: An Examination of Professional Sport Internship Job Announcements
Liz Sattler and Rebecca Achen
The sport management internship has been deemed a critical component of students’ academic preparation, as well as a foot in the door for many students seeking full-time employment after graduation. The number of sport management programs has grown in recent years, and the field itself remains highly competitive. Thus, it is increasingly important for sport management programs to help prepare their students for the internship hiring process. Scholarship in this area has largely focused on student perceptions of their internship experience and employer perceptions of student preparedness. But to prepare students for internship experiences in the sport industry, it is essential for faculty to understand the key skills that are sought by industry practitioners making hiring decisions, as well as the administrative requirements included. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the nature of professional sport industry internship job postings in the United States by examining the content of online announcements during a 6-month period. The results indicated that digital content, sales, and operations internships were the most highly sought positions, while basic computer skills, communication skills (both oral and written), and the ability to withstand long hours were the most commonly desired skills.
Co-Branding Through an International Double Degree Program: A Single Case Study in Sport Management Education
Tim Ströbel, B. David Ridpath, Herbert Woratschek, Norm O’Reilly, Markus Buser, and Michael Pfahl
Scholars forecast that globalization will require sport managers to have competencies in international business. Sport, due to its global nature, has become an international business, leading to sport management programs at postsecondary institutions growing in number and the marketing of such programs becoming a key success factor. In an increasingly competitive educational environment, both effective curriculum offerings and innovative marketing, including branding, are important for a successful sport management program. This article shares a case study of innovative marketing—the co-branding through a double degree program between two long-standing sport management programs, one in North America (Ohio University, United States) and one in Europe (University of Bayreuth, Germany). This program is designed to enhance international education, as well as global internship and job-placement opportunities. The details of the double degree program within the background of co-branding are presented as a pedagogical framework for international education. Data from a survey of industry professionals are analyzed to demonstrate the need for such an international double degree program. Results provide a template for replication by other institutions and identify potential future research.
Introduction to the Special Issue: Global Perspectives in Sport Management Education
Carrie LeCrom and Michael Naylor
There is no doubt that sport has become a global industry. Therefore, it is crucial that global perspectives be integrated into sport management education, which is no doubt occurring. However, little has been published to date on the impact and effectiveness of curricular strategies aimed at internationalizing sport management education. This special issue provides sport management faculty with thoughtful dialogue on how they can educate their students for what has become an ever-changing global landscape. The articles in this issue capture global perspectives representing the breadth of activity across a burgeoning dimension of sport management education. The authors have used a variety of research designs that, taken together, provide a wide-angle lens on the nature of global sport management education and how effective it can be.