Reflect on your practice.
Build a development plan.
Grow your impact.
Campus recreation professionals do far more than manage facilities, run programs, and supervise staff.
Every day, professionals across the field help students find belonging, develop leadership skills, improve wellbeing, build community, and connect with their institutions in meaningful ways. They navigate risk, manage resources, lead teams, solve problems, build partnerships, and contribute to student success. The NIRSA Core Competencies Workbook provides insight into what makes someone effective in campus recreation; what skills help professionals grow; and how professionals identify their strengths and develop new capabilities.
The NIRSA Core Competencies are organized into five domains or professional practice areas:
- Communication
- Leadership
- Operations
- Risk & Resource Management
- Professionalism & Service
Together, these domains represent the capabilities that support effective campus recreation practice regardless of institution size, functional area, or position title. Whether you are entering the profession, leading a functional area, or serving as a senior leader, the competencies can help you understand where you are today and where you want to go next. The NIRSA Core Competencies are intended to complement—not replace—existing institutional frameworks. Many institutions choose to use NIRSA’s competencies as a profession-specific lens alongside broader institutional expectations.
The NIRSA Core Competencies framework and workbook will help transform professional growth from something that happens accidentally into something that happens intentionally.
NIRSA Core Competencies Workbook Download
Thank you for your interest in downloading the Workbook. Your feedback will help NIRSA improve this resource and help us consider what to develop next.
