
Research with Impact at Carnegie School of Sport
Welcome from Dr Leanne Norman
Carnegie School of Sport Research Impact Co-ordinator
It is my pleasure to welcome you to the Carnegie School of Sport Research with Impact website. We are proud to share and celebrate with you the impacts of our research across sport and leisure with outstanding areas of excellence in a number of specific fields. Research-related knowledge and skills benefit individuals, organisations and communities through a diversity of ways and it is research that contributes to real-world change, beyond academia, that lies at the heart of our work within the Carnegie School of Sport.
We are recognised as one of the leading research units within sport and exercise science, leisure and tourism. Through our Research Centres and Subject Groups, we strive to provide a research environment that enables our researchers to undertake work of the highest quality, relevance, and impact, all whilst working collaboratively across the School and externally too. We are a School that includes a rich breadth and depth of expertise across the disciplines. This allows us to be in an excellent position to be a community of researchers that contribute a positive and decisive difference to people, communities, and organisations.
Many of our colleagues are leading researchers within their subject areas, built in part by the development of quality relationships with external partners in order to achieve change arising from their research. We seek to apply our research and exchange our expertise to bring about positive change and benefits for the organisations, the people, and the communities with whom we collaborate. Knowledge exchange and partnering has long been at the heart of research within the Carnegie School of Sport. We have a rich history of undertaking work that contributes to wider social change, of using our research to inform our teaching to improve student experience, and we enjoy a wide range of excellent relationships with partners locally, nationally, and internationally.
Research that is impactful has never been more important as our efforts gather momentum towards the forthcoming 2021 Research Excellence Framework (REF) assessment. More broadly than this, we aspire to continue to build a research impact culture that extends beyond just national assessment. This is so that we ensure our research is of value to people, organisations, and communities.Through this website, you can learn more about the specific areas in which we are recognised for our impactful research. You can access resources that will help to guide you in the design and exchange of impactful research, and learn about new opportunities or access links to increase your development as an impactful researcher. Through this website, you can also locate the sources of internal support that exist to help you in the production of impactful research.
Please feel free to get in touch for further information about the ways in which we produce research with impact here at Carnegie, or to learn more about how we can support you as impactful researchers.

Resources
- https://www.fasttrackimpact.com/podcast
- https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/university-of-limerick/id1217028680
- https://www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/podcasts
- https://audioboom.com/playlists/4610223-a-cup-of-tea-with
- https://www.gla.ac.uk/researchinstitutes/healthwellbeing/podcasts/
- https://podcasts.ox.ac.uk/series/impact-making-difference
- https://juliebayley.blog/
- https://www.fasttrackimpact.com/blog
- https://www.emeraldpublishing.com/news-and-blogs/
- https://www.publicengagement.ac.uk/whats-new/blog
- https://re.ukri.org/
- https://www.ref.ac.uk/
- https://www.publicengagement.ac.uk/
- https://www.fasttrackimpact.com/
- https://www.vitae.ac.uk/doing-research/leadership-development-for-principal-investigators-pis/intellectual-leadership/demonstrating-research-impact
- https://esrc.ukri.org/research/impact-toolkit/what-is-impact/
Stakeholder and Public Analysis Template
https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/6e5046_1b5f19a744e4449095d112473b074b15.pdfImpact planning template
https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/6e5046_8200be7f79564ea890206949d2d87f0c.pdfSocial media strategy template
https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/6e5046_261967cf69d74a3b8dc65b3705ca3fe1.pdfImpact tracking template
https://docs.wixstatic.com/ugd/6e5046_484e67051e5343cfb211cb1100b373ed.pdfOpportunities and events
- PraxisAuril supports knowledge exchange in the UK and works with key stakeholders and partners to promote best practice in the sector. They facilitate interactions between the public sector research base, business and government; bringing together key stakeholders to debate, educate and inform. PraxisAuril conference 2019 (in Harrogate)
- Parliament for Researchers regional training events (various locations over the course of the year): https://www.parliament.uk/academic-training
- Strategy of Impact Conference 2019 - Building the Community: 12th November 2019 – British Library, London, UK https://www.researchfish.net/conference2019
- Open Forum events: Research impact - Ready for REF 2021. 2ND OCTOBER 2019, London https://www.openforumevents.co.uk/events/2019/research-impact-ready-for-ref-2021/
- National Coordinating Centre for Public Engagement annual conference 2019. 4th and 5th December, Bristol https://www.publicengagement.ac.uk/nccpe-projects-and-services/engage-conference/engage-2019
- The Carnegie School of Sport Knowledge Exchange seminar series https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/carnegie-school-of-sport/knowledge-exchange
Contact and support for impact
For any assistance needed related to research impact or to learn more about our research with impact here @Carnegie, please use the following links:
Sam ShermanResearch Support Coordinator
Carnegie School of Sport
Email: S.Sherman@leedsbeckett.ac.uk or CarnegieSportImpact@leedsbeckett.ac.ukDr Leanne Norman
Reader in Sport Coaching
Carnegie School of Sport Research Impact Coordinator
Email: L.J.Norman@leedsbeckett.ac.uk or CarnegieSportImpact@leedsbeckett.ac.ukPersonalised, specialist support is available for Carnegie School of Sport colleagues to support the writing of pathways to impact and impact sections / statements within external funding applications. For further information regarding this and to request this support, please contact either:
Sam ShermanResearch Support Coordinator
Carnegie School of Sport
Email: S.Sherman@leedsbeckett.ac.uk or CarnegieSportImpact@leedsbeckett.ac.uk
Dr Leanne Norman
Reader in Sport Coaching
Carnegie School of Sport Research Impact Coordinator
Email: L.J.Norman@leedsbeckett.ac.uk or CarnegieSportImpact@leedsbeckett.ac.uk
To keep updated with all our latest research and developments, please click on any of the following links:
- Carnegie School of Sport Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/Carnegie_Sport
-
Carnegie School of Sport Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/CarnegieSchoolofSportLBU/
- Carnegie School of Sport website: https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/carnegie-school-of-sport/
Areas of existing research impact
Achieving Racial Equality Through Sport and Leisure
International coach development and education system improvement
Improving gender equity within sport coaching workforces
Changing policy and practice in the prevention of doping in sport
Enhancing Rugby Policy, Player Development and Performance
Influencing obesity policy and practice through whole systems approaches
Community interventions to improve the promotion of physical activity
Our Strategy
We are pleased to share with you our Carnegie School of Sport Research Impact strategy (2019-2021). This sets out our strategic intent for the next two years and for a legacy beyond the 2021 REF exercise. It defines our ambition to become an advanced impact literate School in which we will support our researchers at every stage of the research process to embed principles of impact into the work they lead. Our ambitions will be achieved through an overall focus on how we can support impactful research, with whom, and what benefits can we demonstrate.
The Carnegie School of Sport Research Impact Strategy (2019-2021) will empower our colleagues to understand how impact operates and how it can be facilitated to produce transformative research. By supporting our colleagues to build effective impact into every stage of the research planning process; from design, to engaging with research users, to representing our stakeholders, to bringing about change, and towards sustaining the effects of our research, we will begin to develop even further our levels of research impact literacy. This will ensure we are well equipped to understand, assess and take leadership for connecting research to external stakeholders beyond academia.
Through the strategy, colleagues will understand the routes to achieving impact, what benefits arise from their research, for whom, and how it can be evidenced. They will be able to mobilise their research to bring about real world changes, and we will have a greater understanding of who is part of this process and what skills are required to build this level of literacy. It will support the University’s broader vision to deliver leading research, and more specifically, the School’s strategic plan to be at the forefront of world-leading research in sport within sport and exercise science, leisure, and tourism. This will be realised with our partners through collaboration and knowledge exchange, and for the public benefit through changes that include attitudinal, economic, environmental, health and well-being, policy, decision making, social, cultural, and capacity. In summary, the strategy along with the accompanying action plan, provides the vision and direction to help us contribute a positive and decisive difference to people, communities, and organisations with whom we work.
Dr Leanne Norman, Carnegie School of Sport Research Impact Coordinator
Click to download the Carnegie School of Sport Impact Strategy
Click to download the Carnegie School of Sport Impact Action Plan
- Impact: For the purposes of the REF, impact is defined as an effect on, change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy or services, health, the environment or quality of life, beyond academia.
- Reach: Extent and diversity of the communities, environments, individuals, organisations, and other beneficiaries that have benefited or been affected
- Significance: The degree to which the impact has enriched, influenced, informed or changed policies, opportunities, perspectives or practices of communities, individuals or organisations
- Evidence: Proof of the consequences of the research, its reach, its significance, and that it came from your research
- Pathway to impact: The activities that will increase the likelihood of potential economic and societal impacts being achieved