Executives throughout corporate America have been critical of higher education due to a lack in leadership readiness of recent college graduates. The leadership epidemic of young professionals is being described as the Leadership-Succession Crisis in corporate America where a shortage of young, high potential leaders who are capable of replacing upper-level managers transitioning out of their current roles exists. Recent literature suggests Human Resource (HR) departments are recruiting and hiring former student-athletes as a possible solution to the Leadership Succession Crisis. Participation in sports has long been viewed to provide athletes with increased leadership ability dating back some 2,500 years to the ancient Olympic Games. Athletic involvement is widely believed to provide enhanced leadership development. Athletes have the opportunity to learn and grow in structured environments through ongoing relationships with teammates and coaches. However, limited empirical evidence exists when comparing leadership development of student-athletes with their non-athlete peers. The purpose of this study was to compare whether collegiate student-athletes are better leaders than their collegiate non-athlete peers based on their perceptions of their leadership skills. The study utilized the Student Leadership Practices Inventory (Student LPI) to measure self-perceptions of leadership behaviors of college students (n = 1,454). Kouzes and Posner's LPI is one of the most widely used leadership assessments in the business world and the Student LPI is one of the few leadership instruments designed for and validated on students. The instrument uses a 5-point Likert-scale to measure when students are "at their personal best" as leaders through five practices (Model the Way, Inspire a Shared Vision, Challenge the Process, Enable Others to Act, and Encourage the Heart). Two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performed to measure the relationship between athlete status (student-athletes (n = 660) and non-athlete peers (n = 794)) and division level (Division I ( n = 398), Division II (n = 328), Division III ( n = 728)) on the five leadership practices. The study provides empirical evidence that collegiate student-athletes reported engaging more frequently in four out of five leadership practices (Model the Way, Inspire a Shared Vision, Challenge the Process, Encourage the Heart) than their collegiate non-athlete peers. The results indicate that athletic involvement can serve as a type of leadership development experience for collegiate student-athletes, and that it is reasonable for HR departments to consider candidates with athletic backgrounds as more likely to possess some leader skills than their non-athlete peers during the hiring process.

The book comprises papers presented at the 7th International Conference on University Learning and Teaching (InCULT) 2014, which was hosted by the Asian Centre for Research on University Learning and Teaching (ACRULeT) located at the Faculty of Education, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Malaysia. It was co-hosted by the University of Hertfordshire, UK; the University of South Australia; the University of Ohio, USA; Taylor’s University, Malaysia and the Training Academy for Higher Education (AKEPT), Ministry of Education, Malaysia. A total of 165 papers were presented by speakers from around the world based on the theme “Educate to Innovate in the 21st Century.” The papers in this timely book cover the latest developments, issues and concerns in the field of teaching and learning and provide a valuable reference resource on university teaching and learning for lecturers, educators, researchers and policy makers.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship and difference between how NCAA Division I, team sport student-athletes perceive their own leadership behaviors and how their head coaches perceive the same student-athletes' leadership behaviors. In addition, further analysis examined perceptions between student-athletes and head coaches based on the student-athletes' gender and academic year in school. The study included 121 NCAA Division I, team sport student-athletes and their respective head coaches from two institutions in the Midwest. One of the institutions was a medium sized, four-year, co-educational private university and the second was a large sized, four-year, coeducational public university. The first research question examined the demographic profile of the collegiate student-athletes participating in this study. The second research question studied the relationship between how NCAA Division I student-athletes perceived themselves demonstrating the Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership (Kouzes & Posner, 2008; Kouzes & Posner, 2013; Kouzes & Posner, 2014) and their respective head coaches' perceptions of these behaviors. Using Pearson product-moment correlation, three significant relationships existed between student-athletes and their head coaches for Model the Way, Inspire a Shared Vision, and Enable Others to Act. The third research question undertook paired samples t-tests to investigate the difference between how NCAA Division I student-athletes perceived themselves as demonstrating the Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership (Kouzes & Posner, 2008; Kouzes & Posner, 2013; Kouzes & Posner, 2014) and how their respective head coaches perceived them demonstrating these behaviors. Paired samples t-tests revealed significant differences between student-athletes and head coaches for each practice, Model the Way, Inspire a Shared Vision, Challenge the Process, Enable Others to Act, and Encourage the Heart. The fourth research question explored the difference between how NCAA Division I female and NCAA Division I male student-athletes perceived themselves as demonstrating the Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership (Kouzes & Posner, 2008; Kouzes & Posner, 2013; Kouzes & Posner, 2014) and how their respective head coaches perceived them demonstrating these behaviors. The researcher used ANOVAs and paired samples t-tests to analyze the question. ANOVAs revealed statistically significant differences for the practices of Challenge the Process, Enable Others to Act, and Encourage the Heart. Paired samples t-tests revealed statistically significant differences for both genders with all Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership. The final question studied the difference between how NCAA Division I student athletes, by academic year in school, perceived themselves as demonstrating the Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership (Kouzes & Posner, 2008; Kouzes & Posner, 2013; Kouzes & Posner, 2014) and how their respective head coaches perceived them demonstrating these behaviors. Similar to the fourth question, the researcher used ANOVAs and paired samples t-tests to analyze the data. ANOVAs revealed seven significant differences for four of the practices, Model the Way, Challenge the Process, Enable Others to Act, and Encourage the Heart. In addition, paired samples t-tests showed differences in 18 out of a possible 20 cases involving academic year in school and The Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership. In conclusion, scores between student-athletes and coaches for Model the Way, Inspire a Shared Vision, and Enable Others to Act showed a small, positive relationship; therefore, as student-athletes' scores increased so did their head coaches' scores. ANOVAs revealed significant mean differences in scores between female student athletes and their respective head coaches to male student-athletes and their head coaches. For all five practices, paired samples t-tests showed that the difference between mean student-athletes scores and mean head coaches scores were significant and that gender was not a differentiator when comparing scores for the practices. The independent variable with the most influence was academic year in school. Six-of-the-seven significant findings revealed smaller mean differences in scores between the upper-level student-athletes and coaches compared to lower-level student-athletes and coaches. Finally, significant differences existed in 18 of 20 possible cases comparing the mean scores of student-athletes to their head coaches for the Five Practices of Exemplary Student Leadership when examining student-athlete academic year in school.

Making the Connection: Data-Informed Practices in Academic Support Centers for College Athletes is practical and ideal for those who seek to use research to inform their individual and organizational practices. This volume is primarily intended for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students, though scholars, researchers, teachers, practitioners, coaches, athletics administrators, and advocates of intercollegiate athletics will also find it useful. It comprises a series of chapters that cover a wide range of evidence-based approaches designed to enhance the practices of those who work closely with college athletes. Given the breadth of the field overall, this single volume is not exhaustive, but the current concerns, challenges, and themes of relevance to higher education researchers, practitioners, and others are well addressed. The intent of the text is to spark conversation about how college and university constituents can reframe their thinking about the importance of innovative research to careful, informed practice. Likewise, the contributors hope that it will inspire greater awareness and action among practitioners, as well as advance scholarship in the area of athletics. Each chapter includes current research, and in some cases theoretical perspectives, which should assist practitioners enhance the well-being of college athletes. Each chapter also offers guided discussion questions that are ideal for use as the basis of further conversation in the classroom setting. Adopters of this text will benefit from leading voices in the field who delve into complex issues, shedding new light and presenting unique opportunities for understanding a diversity of perspectives on evidence-based practices in support centers for athletes. In all, this volume provides a rich portrait of data-driven practices designed to assist practitioners and others who work closely with college athletes, and lays the groundwork for an ambitious and long overdue agenda to further develop innovative research that informs the practices of athletics stakeholders and improves the quality of experiences for college athletes.

Developing college students’ leadership capacity has become an essential outcome in higher education over the past decade. Collegiate recreation and intercollegiate athletics are two unique environments that often integrate leadership development initiatives. This volume explores the developing leadership capacity of students in recreation and athletic settings and includes: a variety of conceptual frameworks, including the Social Change Model of Leadership Development, practical approaches for creating leadership education initiatives, discussions of the difficulties students face transitioning from high school to college, and literature and resources for assessing leadership development occurring in recreation and athletics. This volume provides a great resource for practitioners and educators to positively influence the leadership development of students throughout their time at the university. The Jossey-Bass quarterly report series New Directions for Student Leadership explores leadership concepts and pedagogical topics of interest to high school and college leadership educators. Issues are grounded in scholarship and feature practical applications and best practices in youth and adult leadership education.

Leadership has been an increasingly growing topic throughout literature with the mass exodus of the Baby Boomers. These preparation strategies have researchers searching for the best attributes associated with effective leadership outcomes. The following study looks at attributes of two distinguish collegiate coaches to determine if any common themes exist and align with literature findings over the past two decades. Additionally, the study will seek to affirm any commonalities with influential strategies and personality traits to leadership effectiveness.

There are several theoretical models and approaches to define the leadership identity development of college students, however, none of these models adequately frame the specific leadership identity development of collegiate student athletes. The purpose of this grounded theory study is to develop a leadership model to address this gap by explaining the leadership values and behaviors unique to student athletes and to understand if their leadership experiences occur in a staged, scaffolded way. The research questions guiding this study are: What are the staged, scaffolded leadership identity development experiences of collegiate student athletes? What are the common leadership values and behaviors of collegiate student athletes and how are they practiced? These questions were explored using Constructivist Grounded Theory, three contemporary leadership theories, and theories of social and situated learning. Data collection for this study included intensive interviews, photo-elicitation, and practice observations of 12 nominated student athlete leaders across 7 NCAA Division-1 sports at a mid-size, mid-south public university. The findings of this study illuminate that collegiate student athletes do not experience leadership in staged, scaffolded ways. Instead, they experience leadership through a specific set of leadership values and behaviors that are uniquely cultivated in the context of sport. Additionally, this study found that the common leadership values of collegiate athletes are self-awareness, meaningful relationships, selfless commitment, growth mindset and competitive purpose. These are practiced through the leadership behaviors of student athlete integrity, modeling, influence, communication, trust, unity, sacrifice, resilience, work ethic, and discipline. The findings of this study are presented in a proposed Student Leadership Identity Development Model that provides a resource to practitioners and professionals to better support this population on our college campuses. These findings are significant as they can help to more intentionally reframe and retrain the entire student athlete leadership experience as it relates to team culture, leadership roles, and formal and informal leadership learning experiences. The model produced through this study not only fills an existing research gap, it can also be applied to curricular, co-curricular, and sport-based programs on college campuses to enhance the leadership experiences of collegiate student athletes during and after college..