Literacy & Numeracy in an Occupation: Professional Sports Representative

Occupation/job/work area:  Professional Sports Representative

Literacy & numeracy requirements ·         Reading ·         Writing ·         Speaking ·         Listening ·         Mathematical thinking ·         Mathematical reasoning, ·         Calculations ·         Technologies ·         Software	Specific examples of the use of these in particular situations encountered as part of this occupation/job.
Reading	At times high profile players may be required to participate in advertising campaigns for either their sport, as with the rugby League NRL / State of Origin advertisements or brewery and other sponsor advertisements on TV.  Players must be able to read cue cards or teleprompter scripts to deliver their required lines.  Professional players are also required to enter into complex workplace agreements, read and understand the terms of their contract.  They are also required to read and understand the rules of their sport.
Writing	Most professional sporting players know their time at an elite level in a sport is limited due to the physical demands of the position.  As such, players also engage in other work activities in preparation for their retirement as a player.  Many write columns for sports magazines and newspaper articles.  Some participate in commentary on TV networks or gain positions as public relations officers and sales representatives for sponsor organisations.  Regardless, each of these positions will require a player to be skilled in writing and many require a high level of academia associated with various styles of writing (reports, proposals, autobiographies, columns, commentaries, executive briefs and summaries to name a few).
Speaking	Player accessibility is vital to a clubs fan base and corporate sponsorship; thus, players are frequently engaged as guest speakers for corporate events and other public forums to speak and interact with fans and sponsors.   Sideline interviews are usually sought by media following an event and a player, whether on the winning or losing side, is expected to conduct themselves as a professional at all times.  One’s speech must be fluent and appropriate for general broadcasts.  It is not appropriate for a player to simply stumble through an interview with words like “yah mate, tis all good buddy, got a flogging this arvo; but we’ll kick some #*^&@ next time”.   Why?  Because professional sponsors demand more and the general public also require players to be role models particularly for younger generations.
Mathematical Thinking, Reasoning & Calculations	Players become engaged in mathematical thinking both on and off the field.  A player thinks about the current scores in a game.  They must use basic mathematical calculations to inform their decisions.  Is it better to play for field position for a single point field goal or do we need to go for more?  A footballer will want to know how much time is remaining and how many plays might we have left in that remaining time.  A cricketer might need to know what the average run rate required per over remaining is. These are a few of the calculations and mathematical reasoning necessary for a professional sports representative.
Technologies & Software	Today, sporting personalities  are required to engage with fans and promote corporate sponsors and political messages across a variety of media, including new technologies such as Twitter and Blogs.  Computer based literacies require a person to capable of reading and interpreting language in a number of forms; such as in, speech, text, SMS format,  icons  and other pictograms.  For a sporting personality today, it is no longer good enough to simply read or write using traditional forms of communication such as pen and paper.  Today they must be multiliterate and engage in the use of multimodal literacies available through new and developing technologies