BA (Hons) Sports Business & Sports Broadcasting

This module enables students to develop self-awareness and to identify those personal qualities, attributes and skills required for successful progression to Level 4 academic study.

The module provides students with the opportunity to reflect on their existing abilities, and to further develop key academic and study skills.

This module allows students to learn about employment prospects in their chosen area of interest. This includes research about what employers are looking for in future recruits – including technical skills, transferable skills, personal attributes and business awareness – as an important pre-cursor for being able to present themselves effectively to employers using a CV, application form, social media networking and during a job interview.

Students will also develop entrepreneurial skills, being able to formulate a properly evidenced proposal to address the needs of identified consumers, for example, some innovation, service improvement or new business opportunity. They will be able to pitch their idea in a professional manner and using a range of appropriate visual aids.

This module provides students with the opportunity to analyse a problem that relates to their specialist subject area, making use of information gathered from various sources using different methods and strategies.

Once the problem is fully understood, as well as the requirements and expectations of the stakeholders, a project can then be planned and completed in a structured manner in order to implement some intervention to bring improvements and benefits to the inspected situation.

Throughout, students will be required to effectively communicate and report their progress with their project, and make use of the advice and guidance provided by an appropriate project supervisor.

With the rapid growth of digital media, it’s important students have a firm grasp over a number of skills required to be a competent multimedia professional.

The module provides students with an understanding of a range of concepts, models and practical skills related to the industry and will introduce you to the basic skills, roles and responsibilities including match reporting, law and ethics, camera and radio skills and page design.

Understanding Sports Business

The contemporary sport industry has embraced a number of dynamic innovations used in other sectors, helping to transform both its management and administration, steering it in a more professional manner in some aspects of sport, yet not others. Growing revenue has taken on increasing importance yet some sports still have issues with the media monopoly of others. Resistance to change, amateur practices and poor treatment of some players remain within the industry. You will explore these and other key issues through examining how the core parts of the business (marketing, finance, the media, sponsorship, event management, leadership and HR) operate. You will analyse the development of sport and governance of both elite and grassroots organisations.

Principles of Sports Media

This module provides students with an understanding of the multi-faceted world of sports media and an appreciation of how the modern media relates to sport and the business of sport. Sport plays a major role across all media platforms, including print, broadcast and online, and operates at multiple levels: as a source of content, as a competitive business tool in the pursuit of audiences, and as a forum and environment for social media discourse. Students will examine these at both practitioner and academic levels, gaining practical and theoretical knowledge of relevant skills and techniques.

Principles of Sports Broadcasting

This module introduces students to sport broadcasting in terms of both a business and a practical profession.

The main focus of this module will be to introduce students to the practical skills of broadcast production, reflecting current advances within the broadcast profession. With the growth of 24-hour sport channels, the opportunities in sport broadcasting have expanded and students need to be prepared for the challenges of a fascinating and exciting future. In order to succeed in this competitive field, it is vital to be multi-skilled as broadcast professionals are often expected to be able to research, write, shoot and edit their own content. This module will teach students how to operate industry-standard television cameras, audio recorders and editing software. Students will learn to structure their work in a logical and coherent manner and produce TV and radio news assignments for clearly defined sport audiences.

Students will also examine prices paid for broadcasting rights – especially football – as the concept of mediated sport is explored and students understand how the media’s relationship with sport is one of the primary business relationships within global sport today. They will understand the impact of broadcasting rights on sport and the media itself. By the end of this module, students will have received a comprehensive introduction to sport broadcasting from two perspectives: the administrator and the programme-maker.

Media Law & Ethics

This module covers the topics of media law and ethics, and how they control and influence the work of journalists and the media, with specific reference to the sports media and football. As digital

technology increasingly affects both the speed of news delivery across a range of platforms, so too does the scrutiny of media behaviour. You will learn how diverse coverage of sport activity is used to entice audiences, entertain, promote, market and sell, and how it is used in launching and creating specialist media sectors. You will learn about the legal and ethical framework within which a sports journalist must operate, taking into account OFCOM regulation and the Editors Code of Practice.

Entrepreneurship

This module will help you to understand what is needed to be an entrepreneur in the sports industry. You will undertake a range of exercises to evaluate your entrepreneurial attributes, and will work to identify ways in which to enhance these attributes. You will have the opportunity to write a professional-quality business plan.

Audio & Visual Storytelling

This module provides students with a working understanding of modern broadcasting technology and an appreciation of how it can be deployed, along with an awareness of the rapid developments taking place within the industry. Students will build on the theories and practices of broadcast production learnt in Year 1 to create more challenging sports broadcast features. They will explore these aspects at both a practitioner and academic level, gaining practical and theoretical knowledge of relevant skills and techniques.

Students will develop the existing knowledge they have acquired on the degree to produce more sophisticated and engaging television and radio packages; with a strong emphasis on storytelling with pictures and sound, and writing for broadcast, emphasizing the differences to writing for print. There will be a clear and defined progression from Year 1 into Year 2, with raised expectancy and more difficult assignments. Students will also be expected to demonstrate a practical understanding of broadcast regulation and how ethical considerations apply to a broadcast journalist.

At the end of the module, News Days will take place that will challenge the students within an active learning environment to display evidence of the key skills they have learnt on the module.

Research Methods

The aim of this module is to provide the student with an understanding of research principles, a range of quantitative and qualitative research methodologies and appropriate analysis for these. This will enable the student to develop the research skills and knowledge necessary to undertake an independent research project. Students will be provided with support in developing their writing style to incorporate citations and make use of referencing.

They will be introduced to Academic Journals and will use these to inform their understanding of the research approaches used in the sector. This will also serve to familiarise the learners with the role of Journals in their wider study. The final aspect of this module will introduce hypothesis testing, with learners making use of a computer package to undertake simple statistical tests commonly used within their subject area.

Broadcast Studio Production

This module completes a pathway through the degree that has allowed students to develop skills in different fields of sports broadcasting, including sports journalism and studio production. Now they have the opportunity to produce a sports documentary on a topic that has enough journalistic quality to generate interest from a specific target audience. Students will be taught the core skills required to make a powerful documentary film: the narrative techniques in non-fiction visual storytelling; the importance of access to the subject to enable the filmmaker to get ‘inside’ the story being told; and the necessity for decision-making based on ethical considerations such as privacy, balance and accuracy.

Sports Broadcast Documentary

Studying this module will develop your knowledge of strategic management in different organisational and environmental contexts. You will learn how strategic management is applied within football (grassroots/professional) and sporting industries. You will also be able to critically evaluate how strategic information systems support strategic planning and thinking. The module will provide you with theoretical concepts and relevant tools for undertaking strategic analyses, considering strategic choices and making strategic recommendations.

Professional Practice Portfolio

This module is based around a work placement. Under the supervision of a lecturer, you are encouraged to demonstrate initiative by acquiring your own work placement and establishing

contacts within the media industry; but the lecturer, who will already have extensive industry experience, will help and guide you through the process. You will also have the opportunity to gain work experience on a sports news website designed specifically for UCFB students where you will have an active role within the editorial team and create original content. You are asked to write a reflective journal that critically relates your work experience to your study on your chosen degree and training. You will accompany this with the production of a portfolio which will include: a literature review on your chosen field within the media; a consideration of relevant professional and ethical concerns and samples of your work. This will enable you to showcase your skills and knowledge as well as your ability to extract information from a variety of primary and secondary sources. The aim of all this is to help in your search for employment in your chosen profession.

Research Project

This module aims to provide students with the opportunity for independent learning through the completion of an individual, extended research project. The project requires a high level of individual application and commitment to research and enquiry. It provides students with the opportunity to identify, reflect upon and explore a topic that has implications for their own professional development.

Broadcast Practical Project

This module is intended to facilitate independent creative and critical work in a specified area of broadcast production. It requires students to initiate, discuss and negotiate a body of work for the year, and then to take responsibility for the successful completion of that work to deadline.

Contemporary Issues in Sports Media

This module introduces you to many of the challenging and complex contemporary issues that face journalists working in the rapidly-changing, and demanding, world of sport and the media. It will allow you to build and consolidate knowledge and understanding of these issues within the broad arena of sport, media and culture in a discursive manner that will underpin your work in sports media. You will be encouraged to research events, themes and issues that have affected the work of the sports media and, in some cases, changed the structure and administration of sport and the behaviour of journalists.