Dr Carolynne Mason

Carolynne completed her undergraduate degree in Social Psychology (BSc Hons) at Loughborough University and she returned to Loughborough a decade later to complete her doctoral thesis (Conceptualising Financial Literacy: An Ethnographic Study of School Governors). She joined the School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences in 2003 as a Research Associate with the Institute of Youth Sport where she was appointed Senior Research Associate in 2009. She was appointed as a Lecturer in Sport Management in 2015 prior to becoming a Senior Lecturer in 2020, and Reader in 2024.

Carolynne currently teaches on several Sport Management undergraduate and master’s modules including Critical Perspectives in Sport Management (Part A), Sporting Integrity (MSc) and Development of Sport (MSc). She is currently module leader for Research Skills for Sports Managers (MSc) in addition to supervising both undergraduate and master’s students’ research projects and PhD students.

Carolynne has previously undertaken research and teaching roles within the Faculty of Education at Cambridge University, the School of Education at Leicester University, the School of Business and Economics at Loughborough University and the Open University.

Experts in Sport Podcast

Episode 13: What role does community sport play in tackling serious youth violence? Host Martin Foster is joined by Dr Carolynne Mason and Graham Helm, National Doorstep Sport Advisor for StreetGames, a national charity that helps bring sport to disadvantaged communities.

Carolynne’s research critically examines the role of sport in promoting social justice. This involves exploring the role of sport and physical activity in enhancing the lives of children and adults who participate in sport systems which are characterised by inequalities in, inter alia, wealth, gender and race. Her current research spans three key areas:

• Tackling inequalities in, and through, sports participation
• Reducing offending and reoffending through sport
• Promoting Children’s Rights in and through football

Recognising that addressing complex problems like social injustice requires inter-disciplinary approaches, Carolynne successfully collaborates with other internationally recognised academics across a range of disciplines (criminology, economics, psychology, sociology, geography, law) and with external stakeholders to collectively advance academic understanding whilst also impacting directly on practice in the world beyond academia.

Carolynne utilises innovative and participatory research approaches, including visual methods, in order to successfully engage marginalised communities in academic research.

Examples of Ongoing and Completed Research Projects

Tackling inequalities in, and through, sports participation

• Evaluation of TIED project for homeless young people. Newark & Notts YMCA. (2018 – 2022). Co-Investigator.
• Evaluation of Flyerz Inclusive Hockey Programme. Access Sports. (2019- 2022). Principal Investigator.
• Coaching for All. Funded by Sporting Communities CIC. (2020-2021). Principal Investigator.
• Evaluation of Inclusion 2020. Funded by Youth Sport Trust. (2020 – 2021). Co-Investigator.
• The Impact of Sports-Based School Interventions on Academic Performance and Behaviour: Phase 2. Funded by Greenhouse Sports. (2018-2019). Principal Investigator.
• Scoping Study- School interventions on academic performance and behaviour. Funded by Greenhouse Sports and NHS England. (2017 – 2018). Principal Investigator.
• Effect of the Cricket Foundation's Chance to Shine Programme on wider social outcomes for young people. Funded by Chance to Shine. (2015). Co- Investigator
• Gymnastics as a foundation sport. Funded by British Gymnastics. (2015). Principal Investigator.
• Evaluation of Chance to Shine Cricket programme. Funded by Chance to Shine. (2015). Principal Investigator.
• StreetChance Qualitative Evaluation. Funded by Chance to Shine. (2014). Principal Investigator.
• StreetChance Evaluation: Increasing aspiration, promoting respect. Funded by Chance to Shine. (2013). Co-Investigator.
• Evaluation of the Doorstep Sports Clubs Pilot. Funded by StreetGames. 2014. PI.
• Creating Opportunities for disadvantaged young people through the 2012 Olympic Legacy programme. Funded by The Prince’s Trust. (2012). Principal Investigator.
• Increasing young people’s physical activity through ‘alternative’ sports. Funded by Youth Sport Trust/Matalan. (2011). Co-Investigator.
• Evaluation of The Prince’s Trust Football-linked Team and Get Started programmes. Funded by The Prince’s Trust. (2010). Principal Investigator.
• Discovering reasons for drop-out from recreational to competitive club activity. Funded by British Gymnastics. (2010). Principal Investigator.

Reducing offending and reoffending through sport

• The Twinning Project: The power of football in prisoner rehabilitation. Funded by the British Academy/Leverhulme Small Research Grants programme. (2019 - 2022). Co-Investigator.
• Sport and Serious Violence Reduction (Home Office 3). Funded by StreetGames. (2020). Principal Investigator.
• Evaluation of Sport England’s Serious Youth Violence Summer Programme. Funded by Sport England. (2020). Principal Investigator.
• Developing a Theory of Change for Sport and Youth Justice. Funded by the Youth Endowment Fund. (2020). Principal Investigator.
• Safer Together Through Sport. Funded by StreetGames. (2017). Principal Investigator.
• The Use of Sport to Bridge the Gap between Custody and the Community. Funded by StreetGames. (2017) Principal Investigator
• Warwickshire multi-agency Serious and Organised Crime Joint Action Group (SOCJAG) Home Office funded ‘Get on Track’ Evaluation. Warwickshire Police and Crime Commissioner. (2017). Principal Investigator.
• Youth Crime Reduction in Sport Project Street Games, (2015). Principal Investigator.

Promoting Children’s Rights in and through football

• Recruitment of young players in professional football: Defining how professional football clubs can best provide protection for children’s rights. Unicef. (2018-2019). Co-Investigator.
• Child Rights in football: Current Risks and Future Research Agendas. Funded by UNICEF. (2017). Co-Investigator.

• External Examiner Birkbeck University of London
• Member of the Sport for Development Coalition Policy Advisory Group
• Peer reviewer for a number of journals (e.g. European Sport Management Quarterly and International Journal of Sociology of Sport, Sport in Society)

Invited Presentations

• Mason, C. and Walpole C. (2020) Presented the sport and youth crime research to Community Safety roundtable for the Sater-Batson Commission on Poverty, Place and Sport at Houses of Parliament (Jan 2020).
• Mason, C., Downward, P. & Walpole, C. (2019) How effective can sport interventions be in reducing youth crime and anti-social behaviour? Invited presentation at Child Centred Policing Conference.
• Mason, C., Downward, P. & Steenekamp, T. (2018) Evidencing the impact of Sport for Development programmes: Lessons from a scoping study of Greenhouse Sports programmes. Invited presentation at Why Sports?
• Mason, C., Downward, P. & Walpole, C. (2017) Learning from the StreetGames Youth Sport and Crime Reduction Pilot Programme, Invited presentation at StreetGames Annual Conference.
• Mason, C., Downward, P. & Walpole, C. (2017) The effectiveness of sport interventions in reducing youth crime and anti-social behaviour? – Invited presentation at Leicestershire Police Evidence Based Policing Event (March).

• Mason, C. and Walpole, C. (In press) ‘Using child-centred approaches to enhance the evidence base around using sport-based interventions to reduce youth offending’ in Morgan, H. and Parker, A. Eds) Sport, Physical Activity and Criminal Justice: Politics, Policy and Practice, Routledge
• Bayes, N., Mason, C., & Holley, C. E. (2022). Staff perspectives on the feeding practices used in holiday clubs to promote healthy eating in disadvantaged communities. Health & Social Care in the Community, 00, 1–12. DOI: 10.1111/hsc.13757
  
• Bayes N., Holley C.E., Haycraft E. & Mason, C. (2021) Adaptations to Holiday Club Food Provision to Alleviate Food Insecurity During the Covid-19 Pandemic. Frontiers in Public Health, Vol. 9, pp. 1325. DOI: 10.3389/fpubh.2021.661345
• Sharpe, L. Coates, J. & Mason, C. (2021) Voice, vlogs and visibility: the experiences of young people with SEND engaging in the school games, Sport, Education and Society    DOI: 10.1080/13573322.2021.1900804
• Sharpe, L. Coates, J. & Mason, C. (2021)) Participatory research with young people with special educational needs and disabilities: a reflective account, Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health DOI: 10.1080/2159676X.2021.1952297
• Hartley, T., Mason, C., Kay, C. (2021) Co-producing desistance opportunities with women in prison: Reflections of a sports coach developer. Journal of Prisoners on Prisons (forthcoming special issue)
• Mason, C., Darby, P., Drywood, E., Esson, J., Darby, P., Drywood, E. & Yilmaz, S. (2019) Rights, risks, and responsibilities in the recruitment of children within the global football industry. International Journal of Children’s Rights, Vol 27, No 4, pp738-756. DOI: 10.1163/15718182-02704005
  
• Kenyon, J., Mason, C. and Rookwood, J. (2019) Emerging third-sector sports organisations and navigating uncertainty in an ‘era of austerity’: a single ethnographic case study from Liverpool. In Parnell, D., Millward. P., Widdop, P., King, N. and May, A. Sport Policy and Politics in an Era of Austerity, Routledge. DOI: 10.1080/19406940.2018.1425732
• Holley, C.E.; Mason, C.; Haycraft, E. (2019) Opportunities and Challenges Arising from Holiday Clubs Tackling Children’s Hunger in the UK: Pilot Club Leader Perspectives. Nutrients, 11, 1237. DOI: 10.3390/nu11061237
  
• Holley, C. and Mason, C. (2019) A Systematic Review of the Evaluation of Interventions to Tackle Children's Food Insecurity. Current Nutrition Reports, 8: 11. DOI: 10.1007/s13668-019-0258-1
  
• Yilmaz, S., Esson, J., Darby, P., Drywood, E., & Mason, C. (2018). Children’s rights and the regulations on the transfer of young players in football. International Review for the Sociology of Sport. DOI: 10.1177/1012690218786665
• Kenyon, J., Mason, C. and Rookwood, J. (2018) Emerging third-sector sports organisations and navigating uncertainty in an ‘era of austerity’: a single ethnographic case study from Liverpool. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics. DOI: 10.1080/19406940.2018.1425732
  
• Mason, C. (2018), Physical activity opportunities for young people: A case study of StreetGames. In Piggin, J., Mansfield, L. and Weed, M. Eds. Routledge Handbook of Physical Activity Policy and Practice, London and New York: Routledge, pp. 371-383.