Department of Sports Management

Assoc. Prof. Selçuk Bora Çavuşoğlu. I am the vice dean of Istanbul University - Cerrahpaşa, Faculty of Sport Sciences. I am also the head of the Department of Sport Management. I have been working in our university for 16 years. I worked abroad for 1.5 - 2 years. I did research studies there. Until this year, the Sport Management Department used to hold a special talent exam to select students, but as of the 2020 - 2021 academic year, we will start accepting students with their university exam scores. A total of 40 students are admitted to our department each year. 20 of them are men and 20 of them are female students. The purpose of the department is to train students for employment in the field of sports management sciences for public institutions, organizations and for the private sector. Since it is a Sport Management Department, our applied courses are usually offered as elective courses. Our students takes these courses to indulge in social activities. Mainly, 90% of our courses are theoretical. Among these courses, we have public relations, communication skills, sports psychology, sports management organization, introduction to sports sciences courses. We also have laboratory facilities, but they are mostly used by our other departments. As the Sport Management Department, we have reserved one swimming pool and one sports complex for our students. In total, we also have 2 basketball fields where volleyball and other indoor sports branches can be performed. In addition, we have indoor and outdoor tennis courts and a football field. It is equipped to meet the sports needs of the students who come to our faculty both for the courses and social activities. There are universities that we have Erasmus agreements with. Especially last year, we increased the number of countries which we have Erasmus agreements with to 6. These countries are important countries like Germany, Poland, Czechia and Greece. Especially in national organizations, we have increased our institutional involvement and held events with different organizations and institutions. Last year, we invited the women's football team to the panel. We will organize different events in the future. We organize events and organizations throughout the year. International organizations - we don't just do it at our own faculty. Also in the last academic year, we participated in an international organization in The City of Eilat, Israel with our Sport Sciences students. As a part of this event, our athletes participated in a catchball tournament, which is a new type of game. Although our students participated in this tournament for the first time, they returned to our country taking second place.
It is a great advantage, being in Istanbul. In other words, I can say that we are 2-0, 3-0 ahead of Sport Sciences Faculties in Anatolia. Because first of all, we are educating students for the sector. Considering that the sector is generally located in Istanbul, we train students for almost every sector. Thanks to this, as of the first year, they find employment opportunities, and not after graduating. In this sense, in the Field of Sport Management Sciences, they start from the basics of the business and integrate themselves step by step, in sales, marketing, and in terms of internship. Our faculty has good institutional partnerships in this sense. Often our students get in touch with us, and we direct them to the necessary places. Of course, when there aren’t any courses, we also have students who find jobs with their own means. They can work in gymnasiums. Since there is a management department in gyms, they take more roles in sales and marketing. However, even if the students who come to us study in the management department, because they have a sports background, they can also work as trainers and in coaching positions. In our university, we have teachers who have connections with various football clubs. Therefore, thanks to them, our students can work in sports clubs. Again, our students can work in units such as mentoring, coaching and public relations. We don not only provide a program. We carry out education and training activities in a way that a university should. Therefore, it would be wrong to say that this or that course is difficult. Each course is maybe different for each student. As their teachers, we direct our students, who seek support in matters they have difficulties, to the library to study. We also help in situations where we can answer their questions and assist them immediately. But of course, if they come to the classes regularly, listen to the lectures and then carry out library work, they will not have any difficulties.