Dual-career through the elite university student-athletes’ lenses: The international FISU-EAS survey

Abstract

Athletes have the right to combine their sport and higher education careers (e.g., dual career), but differences in the recognition of the student-athlete’s status and availability of dual career programmes and services exist worldwide. The purpose of this study was to investigate the dual career phenomenon through the international student-athletes’ views. Student-athletes competing at the 2017 Summer Universiade were recruited to respond a 31-item online survey encompassing demographic characteristics (Q1-8), sport and university engagement (Q9-13), student-athletes’ knowledge and possible sources of information regarding dual career (Q14-22); and dual career support at personal, sport, and academic levels (Q23-31). Four hundred twenty-six respondents (males: 46%, females 54%), competing in 22 different sports (individual: 74%, team: 26%) from Africa (4%), America (20%), Asia (34%), Europe (39%), and Oceania (3), had experienced previous international sports events (94%). Differences among continents emerged for sport (p<0.001) and university (p = 0.039) engagement, and transfer time from home to the training venue (p = 0.030). Individual sports student-athletes showed higher sport engagement (p = 0.003) compared to team sports counterparts. Differences among university majors emerged for university engagement (p<0.001). Long absence from classes (57%), limited leisure time (50%), financial uncertainty (44%), reduction of training due to education (42%), and overload feelings (37%) emerged. The majority of the sample resulted not familiar with dual career programmes (60%) and public authorities (69%), envisaging national dual career policies at university (37%) and sport (25%) levels. Multiple relevant dual career supporters at personal, sport, and university levels were identified, mainly parents (86%) and coaches (65%). To strengthen the potential of the student-athletes of the future, a dual career network should be established among several stakeholders, for transnational cooperation and sharing of knowledge and best practices through extensive communication between policy-makers, practitioners and those having a strong supportive dual career role (e.g., parents, coaches, and university sport staff).

Effect of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) on Elite Spanish Student-Athletes’ Perception of the Dual Career

“…This barrier becomes even greater if athletes compete at the international level ( Fuchs et al, 2016 ), like in the present study. One factor that affects the balance between the time spent on training and studying is directly related to the distance from the student-athlete’s home to the training venue or university ( Condello et al, 2019 ). The lockdown has allowed for increased time availability, since these transfers were not needed anymore.…”

How has COVID-19 modified training and mood in professional and non-professional football players?

“…According to the previous literature our estimated response rate could be considered appropriate-good [ 21 , 22 ]. Nevertheless, since it is not possible to know the exact response rate, there are still convincing reasons to consider a very good data set the actual responses from 175 Spanish players [23] . All the survey invitations and the follow ups were sent via WhatsApp.…”

The Impact of Covid-19 and the Effect of Psychological Factors on Training Conditions of Handball Players

“…One follow-up was sent to the WhatsApp contacts to improve the response rate after five days. Although we do not know the response rate, the final number of participants can be considered as a very representative dataset [ 31 ]. The questionnaire was available online for ten days starting on 16 April, 2020, just one month after the state of alarm was declared in Spain [ 2 ].…”