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ABSTRACT
Co-produced research can engage academics with non-academic partners to improve policy and practices in everyday life. Accordingly, we collaborated with the United Kingdom’s Strength and Conditioning Association (UKSCA) stakeholders. As an ongoing participatory action research (PAR), in phase one we explored the lack of psychosocial competencies in the UKSCA’s predominantly positivist and bioscientific coach education curriculum and their suggestions for change. This manuscript focuses on the planning step of phase two of our PAR. Twenty-six UKSCA stakeholders engaged in focus groups or one-on-one interviews where they discussed their knowledge, beliefs, feelings, and suggestions of learning psychosocial coaching competencies as part of the UKSCA’s coach education and accreditation pathway. We used a thematic narrative analysis to create one story involving five sequential themes that build towards a plan for the UKSCA’s curriculum changes. The narrative arc starts with the stakeholders uncovering the central problem – the lack of psychosocial competencies. Then, the stakeholders identify the current curriculum as scientific and objective, explore how psychosocial competencies are currently learned through experience, and the story climaxes with a debate on the need for change. In the resolution, they suggest actions for change, particularly a new module for the UKSCA, taught by psychosocial content experts. In the challenge of introducing new disciplinary knowledge to the field of strength and conditioning, the story outlines how PAR can lead to the organisation of a practical plan for ongoing co-production, which may shape coaches’ knowledge construction and a plurality of ontological and epistemological perspectives within the UKSCA.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. The summary videos can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/@101zete.
Additional information
Funding
Notes on contributors
Bettina Callary
Dr. Bettina Callary is the Canada Research Chair in Sport Coaching and Adult Learning and a Full Professor and Chair of the Department of Experiential Studies in Community and Sport at Cape Breton University in Nova Scotia, Canada. She researchers coach education and development, and psychosocial understandings of inclusive coaching. She is the editor for the International Sport Coaching Journal.
Brian Gearity
Dr. Brian Gearity is a Full Professor and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs for the Graduate School of Professional Psychology. He co-edited the book Coach Education and Development in Sport: Instructional Strategies and co-authored Understanding Strength and Conditioning as Sport Coaching: Bridging the Biophysical, Pedagogical and Sociocultural Foundations of Practice. He is editor-in-chief for the NSCA’s practitioner journal NSCA Coach and associate editor-in-chief of Strength & Conditioning Journal.
Kimberley Eagles
Kimberley Eagles is a student in the Master of Arts in Counselling Psychology at Yorkville University and completed a Bachelor of Arts Community Studies degree with an Honours in Psychology from Cape Breton University. She is a passionate kettlebell coach and Masters Athlete.
Christoph Szedlak
Dr. Christoph Szedlak is a senior lecturer and researcher in S&C at Hartpury University, where he leads the MSc in S&C programme. His research involves examining psychosocial and sociocultural effective coaching behaviours, using innovative qualitative methods to disseminate findings to the applied practitioner. He is a UKSCA-accredited S&C coach, tutor, and accessor. He has over 15 years’ experience as an elite S&C coach, working with multiple Olympic and world champions, within a variety of different sports (eg, sailing, cricket, wheelchair basketball).