High school student-athletes' perceptions and experiences of leadership as a life skill

Objectives

The purpose of this study was to gain student-athlete perceptions of: (1) the definition of leadership for high school student-athletes; (2) the process of leadership development in high school sport; and (3) the factors that have helped or hindered leadership transfer between high school sport and other life domains.

Design

This study was grounded in an interpretivist ontological perspective and used focus group interviews to gather insights of student-athletes' leadership experiences.

Method

Purposeful sampling identified 33 high-school student-athlete leaders who were members of student advisory councils for high school state athletic associations in the United States. The 15 females and 18 males participated in focus-group interviews. Reflexive thematic analysis of the interview data was then conducted.

Results

Results revealed that student-athlete leadership was viewed as a skill-set and a mindset, driven by individual agency. As an on-going developmental process, student-athletes gained awareness of leadership skills, increased self-expectations and self-confidence in their use and application of leadership skills, and developed a transformational leadership mindset, as they encountered and engaged with critical learning opportunities in high school sport and gained support from coaches and peers. Leadership application outside of sport was a multidimensional psychological process, including both conscious and implicit elements, and facilitated or constrained by environmental opportunities and social influences.

Conclusions

High school sport offers a unique context where self-agentic youth leadership development in sport and life can occur through experiential learning opportunities. To this point, future research directions and recommendations for practitioners will be provided.