Entry # 3: Serious or Specialization?

Recreation Specialization or Serious leisure, which is the future of Recreation? 

To grasp a basis of these two concepts we must define each one. Recreation specialization is when an individual is active in only one activity or sport. There knowledge and participation usually begin at a young age, some as early as five or six. Reinforcement is gained through peers during the course of the specialization during the activity and outside it. For example in sports you can see teammates reinforcing a behavior of free through during the game and others after by trophy's and stats for individuals success. An example of specialization would be an athlete that been playing a sport at an young age who continued to play only that sport as they went through schooling. 

Serious Leisure is the pursuit of an amateur, an individual that lacks certain skills or abilities to be considered a professional, hobbyist, or volunteer who launches themselves into a particular activity. Usually people who participate in serious leisure have a knowledge basis of the activity that is great but might have found the passion later in life and could not build the skills to take on the career as a profession. An example of serious leisure is an endeavors is an individual that likes basketball but views themselves as not having the skills to play professionally but instead will instead learn all players in basketball in NBA and college stats and life history, a Wikipedia person on the sport. 

Now many of you might be wondering what does these to classification have to do with recreation and its future. There has always been sports and its fans that support the players and know information about them. How does one change the concept of recreation or recreation majors? 

The answer is that recreation itself might not change but the people who teach it or organize the events will. When I think about who I was couched by when I played a sport I know that my couch played that sport prior to instructing others about it. But a recent trend is when individuals find an activity later in life, research it in depth, and use that passion to make a career of it. This relates to recreation and its future by who will be the ones directing the events. Is it going to the person who specialized in the activity at a young age who might not have the extensive knowledge of the history or science of how to achieve optimal results but has the skill set to teach and relate to the audience? That question is still unknown because some can argue there has always been couches that never played who developed the skills to teach later in life. Yes, I would agree with this but to take it a step further and ask is it better to hire a person with a degree or someone who presents the knowledge and passion for a position?

These are things that we must consider when hiring staff. There will always be those who will know more about an activity because they have a passion for it but does that qualify them to direct an activity? This is difficult to answer because a common feature of recreation majors is that they interested the field because they liked a certain activity and want to make that their career. Do you want some who has experienced the activity to teach it for relatedness or do you want someone who has built their knowledge over time who can also produce the desired results? As an employer you must take into consideration of who your clients will be. Are they going to come to you for results or the experience? If it is results then a person with in depth knowledge would be a better candidate. Vice versa is if you want to provided an experience first and results later then a person who the skills, relatedness, and specialization in the activity would be the better choice. 

As many of you are reading this you might be saying to yourself that a person who specializes in the activity also as a serious leisure for it as well. This is a valid argument but in my opinion the difference between the two the the amount of time given to the activity. Those who specialize might not wake up thinking about that activity, start doing it right away, and until they end their day. The example that comes to my mind is animals lovers specifically dog show owners. A judge of the event might know all the qualifications for a pristine show dog but they themselves might not know what goes into getting an animal ready, or exactly how long it takes for certain dogs to make strides across the floor without wasting a step. The judge might know the rules for judging the animals but they do not have the passion for the history of the competition. 

I do not have the answers as to the future of qualifications for who is more qualified to lead recreation activities but I do there will be and already is an impact of those who par tact in serious leisure believing that individuals are qualified to teach, judge, and manage an event they have a strong knowledge in.