The recreation and sport industry generates billions of dollars each year. The success or failure of any recreation and sport organization isn’t just related to what happens on the field—there is a cohort of people working behind the scenes who make it all materialize. Our alumni are those people.
Students in the RSM program learn the science behind our consumption of sport and our need for recreation. They learn the skills to plan and facilitate a wide variety of events and programs to engage participants, fans, and the community. Our students learn the business side of sport and leisure by creating marketing campaigns and risk management plans while also learning how to generate revenue through sales strategies and sponsorship proposals and finally how to supervise, lead and manage both paid and volunteer staff.
Focuses on the leadership, management, and governance of organized sport
Learn MoreFocuses on fostering healthy lifestyles and includes the option to earn a wellness coaching certification.
Learn MoreFocuses on designing engaging and challenging experiences to improve individual quality of life.
Learn MoreWhile the RSM program can diligently prepare students through classroom discourse and applied experiential learning, the best complement to academic education in the sport and leisure Industry is through appropriately designed internship experiences that provide exposure to “real-world” situations and working environments. These experiences are meant to allow the student to grow professionally, to identify strengths and weaknesses, to apply learned theory to practical situations, to network with practitioners, and to gain greater appreciation and understanding for their chosen career path.
The RSM program requires students to complete a 135-hour practicum and a 400-hour internship. The practicum is meant to be completed early in the academic progression while the internship is meant to be completed near the end of the academic journey and serve as a capstone experience for the RSM program.
Minors and certificates allow students to explore secondary fields of study beyond their major. This broadens their education and encourages interdisciplinary thinking by helping them make connections across different areas of knowledge. Minors and certificates also help students diversify their skill set, making them more adaptable and marketable in the RSM industry.
The RSM program offers three minors: Sport Coaching, Nonprofit Management, and Sports Communication. The RSM program also offers one certificate in Recreation Management. Outside of the program, common minors RSM majors pursue include marketing, communication, management, photography, and digital media. Common certificates include: photography and digital imaging, data analytics, entrepreneurship, and multimedia journalism.
The RSM program is committed to active learning in the classroom and outside the classroom. Many of the RSM courses include partnerships with community organizations where students will complete a project or event on behalf of the organization. In addition, our students are actively involved in student skill competitions against other universities and volunteering in the community through an array of events and leisure programs. Students also have the opportunity for global exploration through study abroad trips to Europe to engage with international sport and leisure organizations.
There are multiple scholarships available to students majoring in Recreation and Sport Management. The most common scholarships are the Dr. Ahn Family Future Leaders in RSM Scholarship and the Watkins Charitable Foundation Health Science Scholarship. These and other scholarships can be found through scholarship universe. In addition, as members of the Utah Recreation and Park Association, RSM students are eligible for the URPA Student Scholarship
Email: Joseph.Lovell@utahtech.edu
Phone: 435.879.4631
Office: HPC 305
