Bridging the Gap: Using College Athlete Support Services as Justification for Human Development in a Commercialized Sport Management

International Journal of Exercise Science 15(6): 934-947, 2022. This study investigates the presence of competing educational foundations within college athlete support service units across the 65 ‘Power Five’ conferences to call for more human development elements within sport management education and training. To determine the orientation of professionals within these units, educational foundation is used as the measure given the role education holds in establishing and communicating norms, values, and rules of practice for professionals within the discipline. Information was gathered through staff biographies and triangulated through secondary sources (university archives and social media accounts – LinkedIn and Twitter). Of the total population of professionals (n = 1095), 910 professionals were verified through the data search. The distribution of educational foundations shows an approximate distribution of 51%, 41%, and 8% distribution of human development, commercially-centric, and specialized educational foundations – respectively. Discussion and implications highlight the growing presence of (non-sport management) human development professionals within college athlete support services and calls for more human development orientation within the field of sport management