Exploring the communication of student-athlete pathways as a transformative service in Australian Higher Education

Abstract

In Australia, student-athletes accounted for approximately 60% of the medals won in the 2012 and 2016 Olympics. Despite this success, little research has looked into how student-athlete pathway programs are communicated to support student-athletes. Drawing from the contemporary marketing lens of transformative-services research (TSR), this study explored how universities can communicate student-athlete pathway programs as a transformative service with a focus on student-athlete well-being. To achieve the aim, a content analysis of universities’ sport Web pages (N = 38) was conducted. Triangulation of findings with extant literature from the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia indicated considerable scope for advancing communication of student-athlete pathway programs focused on well-being underpinned by TSR. Specifically, the theoretical TSR lens provides a foundation for focusing communication on attributes and services associated with well-being established as important in supporting student-athlete programs in higher education, providing novel practical insight to establish a pathway in sport systems of Australia and other countries.