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What makes Sport Development and Coaching at Worcester special?

Our sport development and coaching course blends both applied practical skills and knowledge of coaching, with the vital skills and functions of resource management and development, giving you a broad skill range which is attractive to potential employees in a variety of sport sectors.

At Worcester, our innovative combination of sports development and coaching, provides you with a diverse array of opportunities and experience needed to drive high quality sport development and coaching services. This multi-disciplinary approach will also equip you with operational, strategic and project management expertise that will enable you to take a dynamic approach to leading innovation and change within the sector.

During your first year (level 4) you will study fundamental modules common across PE, coaching and development. This provides the opportunity and flexibility for you to gain more information and learn about your degree subject, with the ability to change across one of the related degrees at the end of the first year.

Alongside your degree, you will have opportunities to access a range of Coach Education courses, whilst being able to build your coaching and development experience through placements and employment opportunities within the University and wider sporting community.

Overview

Overview

Key features

  • First year modules common across PE, Coaching, Development pathways offering flexibility on completion of level 4
  • Work-based learning, problem based teaching and practical activities which mean theoretical concepts are frequently applied to practical working environments
  • Opportunities to coach in a range of sports which will challenge and develop your understanding of your coaching practice. You will have the opportunity to coach peers, school groups and external clubs and organisations
  • Expert staff who have taught in the sport development and coaching sectors and have published work in these subject areas
  • Diverse range of future career path preparation, including sport development, community coaching, international sport development, teaching, and entering the growing sector of social entrepreneurship
  • Excellent facilities including state of the art inclusive University Arena, 3G AstroTurf, dance studio, outdoor educational site including lake and outdoor activity centre, S&C suite and gymnasium
  • Opportunities to progress onto routes into teaching or Master's level study
  • Sports-related volunteering and Earn as You Learn opportunities
  • The opportunity to study abroad for one semester
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9th for Student Satisfaction

Our Sports courses are 9th in the UK for student satisfaction in the Complete University Guide 2024.

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Top 25% satisfaction

Our Sports courses are ranked in the top 25% of UK universities for overall student satisfaction (NSS 2022)

100% satisfaction logo

This course received 100% overall student satisfaction (NSS 2022)

Entry requirements

Entry requirements

104
UCAS tariff points

Entry requirements

104 UCAS Tariff points (for example, BCC at A Level)

An Enhanced Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) check is required for this course

Other information

If you have any questions about entry requirements, please contact the Admissions Office on 01905 855111 or email admissions@worc.ac.uk for advice.

Further information about the UCAS Tariff can be obtained from the UCAS website.

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Course content

Course content

Our courses are informed by research and current developments in the discipline and feedback from students, external examiners and employers. Modules do therefore change periodically in the interests of keeping the course relevant and reflecting best practice. The most up-to-date information will be available to you once you have accepted a place and registered for the course. If there are insufficient numbers of students interested in an optional module, this might not be offered, but we will advise you as soon as possible and help you choose an alternative. 

Year 1

Mandatory

  • Principles of Sports Coaching and PE
  • Physical Activity, Health, Wellbeing
  • Scientific Principles in Teaching and Coaching
  • Adapted Physical Activity, Sport and Disability

Optional 

  • Learning to be a Sports Professional
  • Introduction to the Sporting Landscape
  • Optional modules offered by the Centre for Academic English and Skills/School of Education 

Year 2

Mandatory

  • Sport Operational Development
  • Coaching Pedagogy and Practice
  • Creating Successful Research to Inform Practice

Optional

  • Sponsorship & Fundraising
  • Sport and Disability
  • Professional Skills in the Workplace
  • Contemporary Issues in Sport
  • Performance Analysis
  • Sport Tourism and Event Management
  • Optional modules offered by the Centre for Academic English and Skills/School of Education 

Year 3

Mandatory

  • Independent Research Project in Sport Development OR Sport Development Project 
  • Professional Placement
  • International Sport Development and Volunteering
  • Advanced Coaching Pedagogy and Practice

Optional 

  • The Sports Entrepreneur
  • Sport Strategy in Action
  • Group Dynamics in Sport
  • Applied Performance Analysis
  • Disability Sports Coaching and Performance
  • Event Project Management

“Learning and studying at Worcester and gaining my degree has been the single biggest achievement so far. The support and care offered to me by the University has been invaluable and given me a solid foundation to achieve in the future in my chosen career.”

Marc McLaren, Sport Development and Coaching Student and now FP Lead Coach at Wolverhampton Wanderers Academy

Sam Payne

Sam Payne

Children and Young People Manager, Sport Birmingham

“I absolutely loved the Sports Development and Coaching course at the University of Worcester – and not for the reasons I thought I would. I chose the course as I had, and still have, a passion for facilitating and promoting physical activity, however, was uncertain about how best to refine my passion into employable attributes and skills. The flexibility of the course allows me to explore both ‘sports coaching’, a more micro delivery-based avenue of the industry; and ‘sport development’, a more macro planning and overseeing avenue of the industry.”

Marc McLaren

Marc McLaren

Foundation Phase Academy Football Coach, Wolverhampton Wanderers

“Learning and studying at Worcester and gaining my degree has been the single biggest achievement so far. The support and care offered to me by the University has been invaluable and given me a solid foundation to achieve in the future in my chosen career. I will be forever grateful.”

Cade Study - Marc McLaren

Marc's career journey from student to Academy coach at Wolves FC
Teaching and assessment

Teaching and assessment

The University places emphasis on enabling students to develop the independent learning capabilities that will equip you for lifelong learning and future employment, as well as academic achievement. A mixture of independent study, teaching and academic support through the personal academic tutoring system enables you to reflect on progress and build up a profile of skills, achievements and experiences that will enable you to flourish and be successful.

Teaching

You are taught through a combination of interactive lectures, seminars and coaching practicals. Interactive workshops take a variety of formats and are intended to enable the application of learning through discussion and small group activities. Seminars enable the discussion and development of understanding of topics covered in lectures, and coaching practicals are focused on developing subject specific skills and applied individual and group project work. You will apply appropriate sport development, coaching and management models and practices to a range of theoretical and real life situations, in order to make appropriate operational and strategic decisions. You will explore the working environment that sport development officers find themselves in, and understand the complex partnerships and interactions which create threats and opportunities for sport programmes and initiatives.

In addition, meetings with personal academic tutors are scheduled on at least 4 occasions in the first year and three occasions in each of the other years of a course to support your progress and help set realistic achievement targets.

You will undertake modules which have mandatory placement elements (of varying durations) to ensure you are provided with the opportunities to apply the subject knowledge learnt within lectures to the practical environment of the development and coaching industry. You are also required to complete a year long Independent Study or Sport Development project in the third year of the course, supervised by a University tutor.

Contact time

In a typical week you will have around 12-16 contact hours of teaching. The precise contact hours will depend on the optional modules selected and in the final year you will normally have slightly less contact time in order to do more independent study and undertake the work-based placement.

Typically class contact time will be structured around:

  • Interactive sessions
  • Lectures
  • Seminars in groups of around 10-20 students
  • Coaching practicals

Independent self-study

In addition to the contact time, you are expected to undertake around 24-28 hours of personal self-study per week. Typically, this will involve completing online activities, reading journal articles and books, working on individual and group projects, undertaking research in the library and online, preparing coursework assignments and presentations, and preparing for examinations.

Independent learning is supported by a range of excellent learning facilities, including the Hive and library resources, the virtual learning environment, and extensive electronic learning resources.

Teaching staff

You will be taught by a teaching team whose expertise and knowledge are closely matched to the content of the modules on the course. Teaching is informed by research, and the team includes senior academics, and professional practitioners with industry experience. The majority have a higher education teaching qualification or are Fellows of the Higher Education Academy. You can learn more about the staff by visiting our staff profiles.

Assessment

The course provides opportunities to test understanding and learning informally through the completion of practice or ‘formative’ assignments. Each module has one or more formal or ‘summative’ assessments which are graded and count towards the overall module grade.

Assessment methods include a range of coursework assessments such as essays, reports, portfolios, posters, coaching delivery, presentations and a final year Independent Research Study or Sport Development Project.

The precise assessment requirements for an individual student in an academic year will vary according to the mandatory and optional modules taken, but a typical formal summative assessment pattern for each year of the course is:

Year 1

  • 4 Essay/Written assessment
  • 4 Presentations
  • 1 Practical Delivery
  • 1 Portfolio

Year 2

  • 1 test
  • 4 essays / written tasks
  • 1 coaching practical
  • 1 written funding campaign
  • 3 individual or group presentations

Year 3

  • Major Independent Research Study or Sport Development Project of approx. 4000-6000 words
  • 1 reflective and skills portfolio relating to work placement
  • 5 seminar discussion/presentations
  • 1 project planning document
  • 2 Written assessment
  • 1 poster

Feedback

You will receive feedback on all practice and formal assessments. Feedback on examination performance is available upon request from the module leader. Feedback is intended to support learning and you are encouraged to discuss it with personal academic tutors and module tutors as appropriate.

We aim to provide you with feedback on formal course work assessments within 20 working days of hand-in.

Programme specification

For comprehensive details on the aims and intended learning outcomes of the course, and the means by which these are achieved through learning, teaching and assessment, please download the latest programme specification document.

Meet The Team

You will be taught by a teaching team whose expertise and knowledge are closely matched to the content of the modules on the course.

alexandru-radu

Alexandru Radu

Alexandru Radu joined the School of Sport and Exercise Science in May 2010 after lecturing at Northumbria University, where he gained an MSc in Sport Management UK/European and the APT Award (Applauding and Promoting Teaching Award). As well as teaching undergraduate and postgraduate students, Alex is actively involved in coaching basketball – Romania Women National Team, Romania U20 Women National Team, Worcester Wolves (BBL) men team, Cardiff Archers (WBBL) women team and Wales U18 Men's National Team are amongst some of the teams he coached (as either Head Coach or Assistant Coach).

The books Basketball Coaching - Putting Theory into Practice (2015); The Science of Basketball (2018) and Basketball: Skills, Drills and Session Plans (Technical Drills for Competitive Training) (2023) are three of his key publications.

mandy-newbold

Mandy Newbold

Mandy joined the University in 2011 following 20 years’ work within the sport development industry. As an enthusiast for physical activity, sport and getting people active, Mandy works part-time as a Senior Lecturer supporting the Sport Development and Sport Business Management modules, as well as being a Senior Tutor for the Youth Sport Trust Learning Academy.  This has enabled some excellent community development projects to be established by students, including the Pitchcroft Parkrun in Worcester which has been running since 2017.

debra-price

Debra Price

Debra has been employed in the education sector since 1998, working at a partner FE college. During this time she had various roles within the sports department, both leading and teaching on a range of sport related HE and FE programmes. Debra held positions as a Programme Area Manager for Sport and Quality Development Manager and latter, a Teaching and Learning Coach, where she assisted others to raise the standards of teaching and learning across the college. Debra was previously the Course Leader for HND Sports Coaching, a collaborative course with University of Worcester and has taught several sport business modules for FdSc Football Business Management and Coaching.

Michelle Morgan

Michelle Morgan

Michelle Morgan joined the University of Worcester School of Sport and Exercise Science full-time in 2011, after fulfilling a number of part-time roles within the School during both her undergraduate and MSc studies. Michelle has a range of experiences in sports coaching (both in the UK and USA) with a Netball specialism as a UKCC Level 3 coach. In her role as a Senior Lecturer for the BSc (Hons) Sports Coaching Science degree, Michelle uses her industry and academic experiences to support and develop students’ understanding of the demands of the sporting industry, including the skills and qualities needed to be employable.  

 

Craig Williams

Craig Williams

Craig is an engaging and innovative teaching practitioner who blends learning and applied experiences to develop student employability, both during and after their studies.

His extensive network has led to a range of interesting placement and job opportunities for students at the University.

Craig is passionate about most sports, and in his words, still attempts to play football and cricket when the body allows! 

glyn-harding

Glyn Harding

Glyn came to the University of Worcester in 2004 having previously worked as a PE teacher, youth worker and the Assistant Academy Director at Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club.

Since coming to the School of Sport and Exercise Science, he has undertaken the roles of HND co-ordinator and course leader for Sports Coaching Science and has developed the coaching of disabled athletes, culminating in a unique taught degree pathway in this evolving area of study. As part of his role, Glyn supports and provides guidance to elite athletes in their pursuit of sporting and academic excellence; these have included the GB paralympic blind footballers Ajmal Ahmed and Lee Greatbatch, the Port Vale footballer Robert Taylor and GB downhill mountain biker Jessica Stone.

Glyn has been a key pioneer in the development of the Brazil-UK Football Development Course undertaken in partnership by the University of Worcester and the University of São Paulo.

Gill Renfree

Gill Renfree

Gill has been working at the University of Worcester since 2012 and teaches across a range of modules from sport business professional placement to event project management as well as mentoring students undertaking sandwich years in the sport industry and supervising research projects. Gill also teaches in modules related to her research interests such as sports tourism, event management and sports marketing. Gill has extensive experience of working on collaborative projects and continues to research in areas related to Generation Z, gender equity in sport as well as sport governance, leadership, and volunteering.

Dr Paul Blakey

Dr Paul Blakey

Paul is Senior Lecturer in Sport Business Management and joined the School of Sport and Exercise Science in November 2015. Paul has considerable experience within the higher education sector having previously been course leader for Sport MSc programmes at Northumbria University and the University of Chester. He is also Visiting Professor at NEOMA Business School in Paris.

Paul’s PhD thesis, from the University of Manchester, focused upon strategic marketing practices of small and medium-sized businesses in the leisure industry. Prior to embarking on a career in academia, Paul was employed by several sports, leisure and hospitality companies, most notably working as an Assistant Manager with a leading private sector entertainment company.

Paul is the author/co-author of several sport marketing textbooks including the first digital sport marketing book published by Routledge in 2020. He has worked on collaborative, and individual, research publications, conference presentations, in-field event impact studies for sports governing bodies and co-ordinated a nationwide research project for a UK-based leisure corporation. He has supervised PhD students on subjects including surf brands, sports volunteers and sport tourism destinations.

Jaime Guinan

Jaime Guinan

Jaime has been a member of the School of Sport and Exercise Science since 2005, teaching on various HND and undergraduate programmes. She has been working in education for the past 16 years within both further and higher education. Developing extensive knowledge of HND and degree programmes through leading, teaching and externally examining these programmes for a number of years. Within her role as Senior Lecturer, Jaime applies her experience to support student learning and transition within higher education.

Jaime is currently involved in the working project group Women in Sport and Exercise (@UoWWISE) and lead for the health and well-being strand to advocate gender equity in all areas of the sport and exercise domain. This will lead into personal research practice investigating the underrepresentation of women in sport and physical activity.

David Mycock

David Mycock

David consults and researches in the field of coaching science and coaches externally in elite level football. He has helped evolve the game of blind futsal and is a qualified FA Tutor. David is the Head Coach of Worcester Blind FC and has previously coached the England and Great Britain Blind Futsal teams at major tournaments, and is currently the Head Coach of the Czech Republic National Blind Football team.

David has a variety of NGB Awards and as an ex-professional football player is a member of the Professional Footballers Association. His role at the University has grown since 2006 and he is now the Link Tutor for the SSES Partnership programmes with Masaryk University in the Czech Republic.

Find your passion

“I would never have achieved the job I have now without my degree. The course provided me with not only the knowledge but the opportunities to upskill, which I would not have got without the University of Worcester. The lecturers were supportive throughout my time at university too. It was the best three years of my life!”

Kelly Gates, Sport Development and Coaching Student and now Swim Manager at Uttoxeter Leisure Centre, Everyone Active, and Swimming Teaching Tutor for the Institute of Swimming

Careers

Careers

The jobs available in sport development are numerous and varied, dealing with both operational delivery and strategic planning.

Recently graduated students with a degree in Sport Development and Coaching BA (Hons) have entered employment in jobs such as Sport Activity Coordinators, Sport Development Officers, PE Coordinators, plus roles in community coaching and development coaching in various sporting arenas.

Two students are walking next to each other and smiling

Careers and Employability

Our Graduates pursue exciting and diverse careers in a wide variety of employment sectors.

Find out how we can support you to achieve your potential

Studying Sport at Worcester

Costs

Fees and funding

Full-time tuition fees

UK and EU students

The standard fee for full-time home and EU undergraduate students enrolling on BA/BSc/LLB degrees and FdA/FdSc degrees in the 2024/25 academic year is £9,250 per year.

For more details, please visit our course fees page.

International students

The standard tuition fee for full-time international students enrolling on BA/BSc/LLB degrees and FdA/FdSc degrees in the 2024/25 academic year is £16,200 per year.

For more details, please visit our course fees page.

Part-time tuition fees

UK and EU students

The standard tuition fees for part-time UK and EU students enrolling on BA/BSc/LLB degrees and FdA/FdSc degrees in the academic year 2024/25 are £1,156 per 15-credit module, £1,542 per 20-credit module, £2,312 per 30-credit module, £3,083 per 40-credit module, £3,469 per 45-credit module and £4,625 per 60 credit module.

For more details, please visit our course fees page.

Additional costs

Every course has day-to-day costs for basic books, stationery, printing and photocopying. The amounts vary between courses.

If your course offers a placement opportunity, you may need to pay for an Enhanced Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) check.

All Physical Education and Sports Coaching students are expected to wear School of Sport and Exercise Science branded sports kit. This includes a polo top, t-shirt and a hooded sweatshirt and costs approximately £85.

Accommodation

Finding the right accommodation is paramount to your university experience. Our halls of residence are home to friendly student communities, making them great places to live and study.

We have over 1,000 rooms across our range of student halls. With rooms to suit every budget and need, from our 'Chestnut Halls' at £131 per week to 'Oak Halls' at £221 per week (2024/25 prices).

For full details visit our accommodation page.

Sports Scholarships

At Worcester we are committed to supporting elite and talented sports performers who are dedicated to both sporting and academic success. Our sports scholarships are available for a range of team and individual sports. For further information, visit our sports scholarships pages.

How to apply

How to apply

Applying through UCAS

Sport Development & Coaching BA (Hons) (Single Honours) CX61

UCAS is the central organisation through which applications are processed for entry onto full-time undergraduate courses in Higher Education in the UK.

Read our How to apply pages for more information on applying and to find out what happens to your application.

UCAS Code

CX61

Get in touch

If you have any questions, please get in touch. We're here to help you every step of the way.

Alexandru Radu

Course leader