Sport

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Sport Employability What's the connection?
ByDoug ColeSenior Lecturer Bucks New
University
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The Context

• Introductions
• Officially started my research October 1st 2009
  having worked in the sport and leisure industry
  in the UK and Asia since 1993.
• Aims
• To explore the areas raised by the questions
  posed in the previous BUCS publication.
• To consider what is employability, what it is
  not, and how can sport contribute?
• To provide some brief insights into the
  employability research and how features of this
  may potentially be influenced through our own
  sports provision.

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The Challenge

• As we go through this presentation I would appeal
  to you all to try and make connections between
  what you do in the workplace through your wider
  sports provision, with the specific information
  being presented.
• There are not necessarily any right or wrong
  answers here but hopefully there are
  opportunities for us all.

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Introductions to the field

• Background
• Employability - high on the agenda
• Panic on the campus as graduate jobs disappear
  The Independent
• The competition among graduates seeking work has
  got several degrees more difficult The Times

Provision
Employability
Emotional Intelligence
Sport
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Employability Here to stay?

• Very first HE courses in subjects such as Law
  Medicine
• Government Support - Dearing Report 1997, Leitch
  Review 2006 , HE to offer opportunities to
  develop job related skills
• QAA and Higher Education subject benchmark
  statements - Clear need to address employability
  to commit to a pedagogical approach designed
  for the development of employability skills with
  students in HE
• Background
• Society trends
• We cannot call to mind any psychological text
  that commends one-off skills development units
  and recall that many say that skills are best
  developed by being applied to a range of
  worthwhile material. Skilful practices are best
  developed across a whole programme in order to
  provide practice, reinforcement and opportunities
  to apply those practices to different content
  through increasingly authentic tasks. (Knight
  Yorke, 200443)
• Taking lessons from the sports fields and pitches
  and applying them in life.

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Employability What is it?

• What is employability? Range of definitions and
  models
• Yorke Knight (20063) as
• A set of achievements skills,
  understandings and personal attributes that make
  graduates more likely to gain employment and be
  successful in their chosen occupations, which
  benefits themselves, the workforce, the community
  and the economy.

Knight Yorke (2004)
Kumar (2007)
Dacre Pool Sewell (2007)
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Employability Common Themes

• Emotional Intelligence Mayer Salovey (1997),
  Goleman (1998)
• the capacity for recognising our own feelings
  and those of others, for motivating ourselves,
  and for managing emotions well in ourselves and
  in our relationships.
• Emotional Social Competencies Boyatzis (2008)
• Emotional Intelligence Dacre Pool Sewell
  (2007)
• Self in SOAR Kumar (2007)
• Skilful practices, efficacy beliefs
  metacognition Knight Yorke (2004)
• Multiple Intelligences Gardner (1983)
  (Intrapersonal Interpersonal)
• Practical Intelligence tacit knowledge
  Sternberg (2000)
• Emotional Social Competencies Boyatzis (2008)

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Employability What it is not?

• Common misconceptions/assumptions Short-term /
  Linear views
• Employment V Employability Employment is
  about a job, employability is about a career!
• Lack of understanding / Resistance
• Vocational v Employability
• Background
• Dacre Pool and Sewell (2007) raise concern that
  too many people may have a rather over-simplistic
  view of employability as being about securing a
  job or merely developing a number of individual
  skills.
• " ...employability goes well beyond the
  simplistic notion of key skills, and is evidenced
  in the application of a mix of personal qualities
  and beliefs, understandings, skilful practices
  and the ability to reflect productively on
  experience." (Higher Education Academy Online)

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So whats the connection? How does this apply to
sport?

• ?

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Making the connections exercise

• In small groups please discuss how your wider
  sports provision can specifically hit these
  defined areas
• Group feedback

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Employability So whats the connection?

• Education today typically subject specific focus
  / results and funding driven
• Considering the theories and models Where are
  the gaps in education and training opportunities
  and how can we change this?
• Can sporting provision potentially address some
  of these gaps? How might we demonstrate this?
• Background
• The International Employer Barometer survey 2007
  confirms that over 85 of the employers view
  social skills and personality type as the most
  important skills and capabilities when recruiting
  graduates. Direct links to participation in
  sport?
• 60 rate a good degree qualification as
  important, Archer Davison (2008)

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Its all about people!

• Reality?
• Education does not essentially value the ability
  of people to effectively engage and have
  productive relationships with others, sport can!
• Our sports provision already address many of
  these areas, but with further enhancement this
  could be made more explicit so that students
  recognize the value of these competencies, so
  that they may then be further developed and
  utilized in others areas of life
• 
  
  
• Background
• Creating Learning Partnerships Carroll
  Gimbert (2008)
• 2 way process / relationships

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• Lets use sport as a vehicle to help address this
  ongoing challenge!

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References

• Archer,W. Davison, J. (2008) Graduate
  Employability What do employers think and want?
  The Council for Industry and Higher Education
  (report) London
• Boyatzis, R.E Saatcioglu, A. (2008) A 20 year
  view of trying to develop emotional, social and
  cognitive intelligence competencies in graduate
  management education. Journal of Management
  Development, Vol.27, No. 1, pp92-108
• Carroll.M Gilbert,M.(2008) Becoming An
  Executive Coachee Creating Learning
  Partnerships. England Vukani Publishing,
• Collins,M. (2010) Examining sports development.
  1st ed. Oxon Routledge
• Dacre, Pool,L , Sewell, P. (2007), The key to
  employability developing a practical model of
  graduate employability Journal of Education
  Training, Vol.49 No 4, pp 277-289
• Gardner, H. (1983). Frames of Mind. New York
  Basic Books Inc.
• Goleman, D. (1998), Working with Emotional
  Intelligence, Bloomsbury, London.
• Higher Education Academy (n.d) Employability in
  Higher Education, (online) Available from
  www.heacademy.ac.uk/936.htm (accessed 12/12/08)
• Knight, P. Yorke, M. (2004) Learning,
  Curriculum and Employability in Higher Education.
  Abingdon Routledge Falmer.
• Kumar,A. (2007) Personal, Academic Career
  Development in Higher Education. Abingdon
  Routledge
• Mayer, J. and Salovey,P. (1997) What is emotional
  intelligence? New York Basic Books
• Sternberg, R.J (2000) Practical intelligence in
  everyday life. Cambridge Cambridge University
  Press
• The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education
  (2008) Hospitality, leisure, sport and tourism
  benchmarks 2008, Mansfield, UK
• Yorke, M. Knight, P. (2006) Embedding
  employability into the curriculum. Learning
  employability series one, York, UK The Higher
  Education Academy

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• Thank you
• Any Questions?