Dan is a Senior Lecturer in Sport Development with a research and teaching focus in sport for development. His work examines issues of inclusion, equity, and social value.

Dan has worked in a range of sport development, community, and young-people focussed occupations. His professional experience led him to pursue doctoral research that explored the empowering potential of community sport development practices in the UK. He is an active researcher and currently leads a number of commissioned national and regional evaluation projects that examine the impact of sport-based programmes for a wide range of social outcomes, supporting partners to develop their monitoring, evaluation and learning practices.

Dan's research expertise covers several aspects of sport for development theory and practice, with a specific focus on community models of delivery, power and governance, qualitative evaluation methodologies and theory-based evaluation. He has provided research and consultancy services for Sport England, The Football Foundation, Positive Futures, and The Lord's Taverners.

Dan is also passionate about physical activity in the outdoors and is currently engaged in research that explores issues of access and inclusion for underrepresented groups, and captures the social value of green space.

The Centre for Social Justice in Sport & Society at Leeds Beckett University offers innovative methods to help sports organisations understand and evidence the true impact of their community programmes. Traditional key performance indicators (KPIs) often fall short in fully capturing the value and social impact of these initiatives. To address this, the Centre uses cutting-edge ripple effect mapping techniques, which involve gathering insights from all programme stakeholders to assess how, where, and why a programme makes a difference. These methods not only provide a deeper, more comprehensive understanding of a programme's impact but also allow organisations to present their achievements in an engaging and informative way. This approach ultimately supports greater programme efficiency and cost-effectiveness.

Links:

Centre of Social Justice in Sport and Society: https://www.leedsbeckett.ac.uk/research/centre-for-social-justice-in-sport-and-society/

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Researching and Evaluating Sport for Development Programmes (with Dr. Dan Bates)