Articles by author: ch21tf

  • Cameron Hubscher – Exit Blog, Marketing, Communications, and Event Coordinator

    Friday, August 11, 2023 | By

    Just three months ago, I began my internship as the ‘Marketing, Communications, and Event’ Intern at the Centre for Sport Capacity. Now that it is coming to an end, I can take a birds-eye view of what I’ve done at the CSC, and the lasting impact the Centre will have on my career. 

    Firstly, I would like to thank Dr. Julie Stevens, Director of the CSC, and Grace Nelson, Coordinator at the CSC, for granting me this opportunity. From the first time I met them during the interview process to my last day at the Centre, I have been treated exceptionally well. They have granted me every opportunity to succeed and grow. If you are a student interested in gaining experiential education, the Centre for Sport Capacity is an organization that offers so many amazing opportunities.  

    Throughout my time at the Centre for Sport Capacity, I was constantly given opportunities to develop skills that I already considered my strengths while being supported in areas that I wanted to develop. From a day-to-day perspective, my tasks revolved around content creation for the CSC’s Twitter and LinkedIn accounts, responding to emails, attending meetings, and collaborating with the rest of the CSC team on supporting our members. This allowed me to develop skills surrounding copy writing, social media and web design, and the management of social media accounts across multiple platforms. I was also granted the opportunity to attend four events: Parasport Ontario’s Niagara Parasport Festival, Niagara Geoparks’ Niagara Trail Summit, Sport Niagara’s Launch Event, and Brock University’s SMART START activation for incoming students. Being a part of these events as well as numerous meetings allowed me to develop my networking skills.  

    My main task throughout the duration of my internship at the Centre was to reimagine their social media, website, experiential education, and events analytic databases. The CSC collects a lot of data in order to engage their target audience, enhance social media and website performance, and analyze the Centre’s growth. I was in charge of finding ways to collect data in an efficient and sustainable manner. This meant developing Excel databases that could be replicated for future semesters while connecting them to the CSC’s Master files. To accomplish this, I utilized a number of different Excel formulas that count, sum, average, and sort the range of different metrics the CSC collects. With formulas that are linked to various different sheets and other files through the CSC database, retrieving analytics from semester-to-semester and over the course of a year is an effortless process.  

    While being in charge of the CSC’s data management, I was tasked with defining the terminology of the databases, gathering key metrics and comparing analytic performance across the Centre’s social media, website, experiential education, and event analytics. This resulted in the production of a number of internal reports used to showcase the growth of the CSC to the Faculty of Applied Health Sciences. Due to the statistical evidence of growth within the Centre, the CSC was able to acquire operational support until the end of 2024. Seeing the results of my work at the Centre was a major source of gratification. It also reinforced my commitment to leave the CSC with a method of sustainability for their data collection.  

    One of the projects that I am most proud of is my legacy piece. This document is a culmination of all the terminology that makes up the databases, the process of data management at the CSC, visuals, and external resources. Within these topics are the definitions of each term in the databases and their application for the Centre, data collection methods, and the steps to add data into the Semesterly and Master CSC files. Future interns will be able to search through and reference this document when participating in the data collection process. As a legacy piece, I am happy to know that my work will be supporting the Centre long after my time has passed.  

    As I conclude my internship at the Centre for Sport Capacity, I feel that my professionalism, technical skills revolving around social media and Excel, as well as my ability to translate and mobilize knowledge can be considered assets going forward in my Sport Management undergraduate degree, and beyond. While I will continue my professional development beyond time at the Centre for Sport Capacity, the foundation the Centre has given me for my career in sport is something I will never forget. Leaving filled with pride knowing that my impact on the Centre will go beyond my internship, I am excited to see what’s to come for the CSC!  

    Categories: Students

  • July Member Showcase – Dr. Ashley Thompson

    Thursday, July 13, 2023 | By

    Background

    I did my undergrad, master’s, and Ph.D. at the University of Ottawa. During my master’s and Ph.D., I focused on understanding organizational change in nonprofit sport organizations in Canada in hopes of helping these organizations better manage change. I also had the opportunity to work on a SSHRC-funded project which set the stage for the research I do now. 

    Teaching

    This year, my courses include SPMA 4P25 –  Strategic Alliances, SPMA 2P98 – Sport Event Management, and SPMA 3P98 – Sport Event Critical Issues Management. Strategic alliances is essentially a course about managing a sport organization’s strategy – what is called strategic management. To practice developing and executing a strategy, the students participate in a semester-long simulation called The Business Strategy Game, where they run an athletic show company (think Nike or Adidas) and compete against each other. Sport Event Management introduces students to the world of sport events. We discuss events of all sizes, including small-scale, medium-sized, large-scale, major, and mega events such as the Olympic Games. Students go out into the field and evaluate a sport event themselves, connecting their experiences back to what we learn in the classroom. Finally, Sport Event Critical Issues Management can be considered an advanced course in sport events. The goal of this course is to bridge the gap from the classroom to industry practice; it’s designed for those students looking to work in sport events in the future. 

    Research Work/Project

    My research focuses on three interrelated streams: governance, strategy, and organizational change. One major project recently concluded was a study focusing on understanding the impacts of certain dynamics on the success or failure of organizational change initiatives. Specifically, the project focused on exploring how culture, politics, capacity, and technology, enabled or constrained (blocked) organizational change from happening. In addition, I was part of a SSHRC-funded project which examined the interrelationship between governance, brand, and social media in Canadian national sport organizations. From a governance standpoint, the project focused on understanding the structure and design of these contemporary sport organizations. 

    Are you involved in any clubs/associations?

    North American Society for Sport Management; European Association for Sport Management; Sport Management Association of Australia and New Zealand.

    What’s your favourite TV show right now?

    Friends, it’s always Friends. Or Suits. 

    What are your current hobbies/interests?

    I like to be outside and physically active as much as possible. My favourite hobbies include golf, hiking, basketball, and cycling. 

    What’s your favourite book?

    I don’t know if it’s a favourite, but one book that profoundly impacted me during my graduate studies was “Lean In for Graduates” by Sheryl Sandberg and Nell Scovell. It’s a great book for young professionals – particularly women – entering the workforce. I highly recommend it. 

    Categories: Member Showcases

  • July Member Showcase – Dr. Changwook Kim

    Wednesday, July 05, 2023 | By

    Background

    I am currently in my first year at Brock University, serving as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sport Management. Prior to joining Brock, I completed my PhD in Health and Human Performance with a concentration in Sport Management at the University of Florida. Before pursuing my doctoral studies, I spent three years as a full-time instructor and naval officer (first lieutenant) in the Department of Sport and Culture at the Korea Naval Academy, where I taught courses in sport and physical education to naval cadets. As a researcher, I have developed a diverse range of skills in sport management, spatial analytics, and community science through my involvement in numerous projects. I have applied spatial panel data analysis, longitudinal panel data analysis, and simulation modeling to these projects. My expertise lies in advanced statistics and methodology, utilizing tools such as Mplus, Stata, ArcGIS, Geographically Weighted Regression, and the R programming language. These advanced analytical skills allow me to contribute significantly to the design of population-based regional sport policies. Additionally, I highly value collaboration with colleagues from different disciplines to conduct interdisciplinary research and uncover new theoretical and practical insights. I seek interdisciplinary work using aspatial and spatial analytics to analyze a variety of sport-related data in the context of sport and community. To date, artificial intelligence and its derivatives (e.g., machine learning) have garnered great attention in real-world businesses and academic environments. Thus, I endeavor to combine my spatial analytical skills and traditional models (e.g., the latent growth curve model) with machine learning algorithms (e.g., random forest), employing the ArcGIS, GWR, and R programming languages. Such integrated approaches would contribute significantly to unique analytical model developments that cannot be addressed or produced by traditional methods used in sport discipline. I believe my innovative approaches could extend the limits of the existing scholarship by bringing attention to measurements and further engendering applications within sport literature. I am thrilled to have the opportunity to join the CSC team, as it allows me to not only make meaningful contributions to Brock’s high-quality academic culture but also generate and disseminate knowledge that empowers the sport industry in enhancing active, healthy, vibrant, sustainable, and resilient communities.

    Teaching

    I teach SPMA 3P07 (Quantitative Analysis for Sport Management), SPMA 3P94 (Information Systems for Sport Analytics; scheduled for Fall 2023), and SPMA 2P92 (Data Management and Technology for Sport Management; scheduled for Winter 2024). Specifically, I have invested my time and effort in course content development for advanced analytics, using Excel, R programming languages, Tableau, and ArcGIS. Advanced data analytics has recently been in the spotlight in business, public health, and community development. Thus, such analytics courses could provide students with new knowledge of sport business and sport policy as they learn how to identify and organize information in the decision-making process for designing competitive community sport resource distributions. 

    Research Work/Projects

    1. Sport Industry and Community Resilience: Kim, C., Kim, J., & Jang, S. (2021). Sport clusters and community resilience in the United States. Journal of Sport Management, 35(6), 566-580.

     Community resilience—a set of interconnected adaptive capacities based on economic, social, and community resources—has been increasingly highlighted as the key framework within which to build a model to cope with disturbances in socioeconomic conditions derived from adversity (Norris et al., 2008). Thus, in my paper published in the Journal of Sport Management, I attempted to empirically investigate the macro-level association of sport industry clusters with community resilience in light of (a) whether the clustering of sport industries influences community resilience and (b) how the association between sport industry clusters and community resilience varies across communities. To address those objectives, I applied aspatial (e.g., OLS model) and spatial (e.g., GWR model) econometric analyses to macro-level empirical data on sport industry clusters (e.g., location quotient) and community resilience across 3,108 counties in the contiguous United States. I found that some of the clusterings of sport industries (e.g., sport facilities) could play a vital role as providers of transformative industry services, whereas their overall impact on community resilience could be either positive or negative, depending on the spatial heterogeneous effect affected by the local (nonsport) assets and resources. From an overarching perspective, this study has provided insight into the question of whether the community’s sport infrastructures and businesses contribute to the development of a set of community assets and resources that help prepare for, respond to, and recover from crises and disasters.  

    1. Sport Media and Consumer Resilience: Kim, C., Kim, J., Lee, J. H., & Inoue, Y. (2023). Bouncing back: unpacking the influence of sport media on consumer resilience. Journal of Sport Management, 37(1), 51-65.

    The primary objective of this study is to empirically examine the influence of sport media consumption on the relationships between spatially explicit risks of COVID-19, resilience, and positive and negative affect, while considering social class. To accomplish this, in my paper published in the Journal of Sport Management, I employed an integrated approach that combined spatial and aspatial analyses. The results revealed that sport media consumption helps mitigate the negative impact of spatially explicit COVID-19 risks on resilience. In turn, a higher level of resilience contributes to increased positive affect and decreased negative affect. Additionally, individuals belonging to the upper social class displayed a more pronounced resilience process through sport media consumption compared to those from the lower social class. By uncovering the moderating effect of sport media consumption within social classes and addressing the spatially explicit risks of COVID-19, this study enhances our understanding of the association between sport and resilience. These findings serve as a foundation for developing resilience strategies based on sports during challenging times.  

    1. Community-Level Physical Activity and Well-Being: Kim, C., & Kim, J. (2022). Urban sprawl and leisure time physical activity. Sport Management Review, 25(4), 608-630.

    In my published article in Sport Management Review, I attempted to measure the association of urban sprawl with different leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) types at the county level (sixty-seven counties in Florida), considering spatial features (spatial heterogeneity and dependence). To that end, spatial regression analysis using GWR with GIS-based mapping was employed to address the spatial heterogeneous effect in the association between urban sprawl and LTPA types. The findings indicate that different types of LTPA (e.g., moderate and vigorous LTPA) at the county level could be positively or negatively associated with urban sprawl and, thus, affected by the spatial heterogeneous factors. This study has extended the behavior-specific framework of LTPA primarily used in existing research to area-specific modeling by identifying the spatial variability between urban sprawl and LTPA. In addition, the findings have provided a better understanding of the spatial and regional approach for increasing LTPA along with specific regional attributes that link community-level strategies. 

    Are you involved in any clubs/associations? 

    • North American Society for Sport Management 

    What’s your favourite TV show right now? 

    • Netflix K-dramas and sports documentaries 

    What are your current hobbies/interests? 

    • Gym Workouts (burning belly fat, losing weight, and trimming body) 

    What’s your favourite book? 

    • Joy of Learning by Hironawa Heisuke 

    What’s your favourite sport or sports team? 

    • Hanhwa Eagles (Korean Baseball Organization)
    • Toronto Blue Jays (Major League)
    • Florida Gators baseball (US Division I of the National Collegiate Athletics Association).

    What is the first Achievement/Memorable Moment that comes to mind? 

    Above all, I am honored to be a part of the faculty of the Department of Sport Management and a member of the Centre for Sport Capacity. I am also grateful to receive the following awards and grant:  

    1. 2021 North American Society for Sport Management: Winner of Student Research Competition
    2. 2021 North American Society for Sport Management: Recipient of Doctoral Research Grand Award
    3. 2020 North American Society for Sport Management: Final List of Student Research Competition

     

    Categories: Member Showcases

  • Cameron Hubscher – Entry Blog, Marketing, Communications, and Event Coordinator

    Thursday, May 11, 2023 | By

    Whenever someone has asked me what I want to do in life, my answer has always been to be involved in sport. Being immersed in sport is where I find myself most comfortable, while also feeling the most motivated to create positive lasting change. Now, the Centre for Sport Capacity will be providing me with the opportunity to get real experience working in sport. 

    My name is Cameron Hubscher. I am a Sport Management Student at Brock University, graduating in the Spring of 2024. My favourite sports are hockey and tennis. I am from Montreal, Quebec, so naturally I am a fan of the Montreal Canadiens. Some of my areas of interest are Sport Psychology, Mental Performance, Analytics, and Scouting/Recruitment of athletes. In the future, I plan on completing a Master’s degree in Sport Psychology in order to become a Mental Performance Consultant. Feeling the need to learn more about my passions led me to join the Centre for Sport Capacity (CSC) as the Marketing, Communications, and Event Intern. As I complete my first week interning at the CSC, it is clear that the environment will be an instrumental part of my development as I move forward with my career in sport.  

    When I first came across the CSC’s intern position posting on the Brock University Career Zone, the title of the organization caught my eye. Prior to doing any research, the Centre for Sport Capacity sounded like an organization that worked in areas of athlete support. Given my future aspirations, I needed to know more. Fuelled with curiosity, I began to search for what the CSC was all about. I was pleasantly surprised that a number of their current projects & past events aligned with my future ambitions. This includes events such as the Athletes First: The Promotion of Safe Sport in Canada, the Hockey Culture Webinar from the CSC Forum Series as well as the Safe Sport Project and the Sport For Life E-Learning Modules from the CSC’s Project List. While looking through the CSC’s extensive impact on sport in the Niagara region and beyond, I felt the Centre’s goal surrounding the enhancement of diversity, inclusion, and accessibility to sport to be the prominent themes of the organization. These pillars of their organization fully align with my values. Further within the position, due to the entrepreneurial focus of my future aspirations, my personal development of marketing, communications, and events-based skills are a priority to feel prepared for life after University.  

    Something that stuck out to me during my interview with the CSC, was their curiosity in my interests. Our Director, Dr. Julie Stevens and Coordinator, Grace Nelson, wanted to know the areas in which I felt most comfortable so they could tailor the internship experience to my strengths. I consider this to be a unique aspect of the Experiential Education opportunities at the CSC. They have given me the liberty to tackle projects that I have interest in as opposed to a copy-paste internship structure. I look forward to continuing to develop my skills in data analysis in a formal work environment by working to refine the CSC analytics database and collect current statistics for the Centre. Additionally, I will focus on increasing my knowledge of different forms of social media and developing partnerships with key organizations for the CSC. I also look forward to expressing my opinions with knowledgeable CSC members as well as developing the tools to run meetings independently. 

    From my past experiences, I bring to the CSC a knowledge of analytics and Excel data collection from two years with the Fort Erie Meteors as a Statistics Tracker and Data Analyst, which will help enhance the efficiency of the CSC’s social media and website, while also interpreting trends to further aid their digital activity. My past as a Junior Development Director at a private tennis club allows me to plan for future events and coordinate with multiple stakeholders. During this time, I hosted and organized events for the junior program while also creating initiatives to increase involvement and connection from the junior members to the junior program.  

    Paraphrasing Dr. Taylor McKee, a wonderful professor, mentor and prominent member of the CSC, “Sport is not inherently good. There is a misconception that sport is good, and that sport alone can create positive change. In reality, sport is a vessel in which positive change can occur.” Based on my brief time with the Centre for Sport Capacity, it is evident that they understand this notion and that the Centre makes a significant effort to use sport for good by creating positive sustainable change within their community. 

    Categories: Blog, Students