An Alberta exploratory study finds early AI use by sports and recreation departments is focused on brainstorming and time savings.
By Angela Kryhul
AI is showing up in sports and recreation operations, but not always where you might expect. An exploratory Alberta study led by Julie Booke, associate professor, sport and recreation management, Mount Royal University, Calgary, suggests most recreation professionals are not yet using AI broadly. Where it is being used tends to be low risk, practical work: drafting program descriptions, supporting marketing content and polishing written materials.
Where AI shows up
Booke is careful to frame the work as an early read, not a definitive market report. The responses offer a useful pulse for rights holders, venue operators and event partners who work closely with public recreation systems. The online study captured 43 responses, with many respondents working as programmers and directors for public recreation facilities in Alberta.
The study starts with facilities and expands into other functional areas, including program planning, marketing, human resources, risk management and evaluation. In the coming weeks, Booke is planning on rolling out the survey nationally.
Program planning and marketing
If AI is getting traction anywhere, it is in tasks that save time and speed up ideation. “Under program planning, the majority of usage is around helping with program descriptions, program names and drafting some of the communication,” Booke says.
Booke connects the operational value directly to frontline service: “AI could help provide more time for the face-to-face stuff. That’s the important part for recreation program planners—being with people.”
In business and marketing, the pattern is similar: high volume writing and creative support. “The highest usage of AI was in social media, content creation and creating program announcements,” Booke says. “The other big ones in this category were using AI to help write reports, advertisements, communications and memos.”
Human resources and risk
In human resources, the data points to hesitation, and for good reason. Responses suggest limited use in grant writing and mixed usage for job postings, reference letters and interview questions, with the latter drawing the highest yes response. Booke’s view is that HR is an area where guardrails matter greatly.
“Generating interview questions that are appropriate is okay. But having AI decide who gets the job is not okay. Having AI go through their resumes and pick who’s going to get shortlisted for an interview is not okay. That should be done by a human,” Booke says.
Risk management shows similar caution in the responses. “There were three questions about risk management, planning waivers and developing emergency plans. A handful of people said they used it sometimes, but the majority said no.”
In facility management, usage is mostly limited to proofreading and grammar checks, with very limited adoption for maintenance, wayfinding or map development. Booke also flags that adoption may be happening invisibly, where “people are using AI, but don’t realize it.”
Policies, training and what’s next
Across categories, the benefits and barriers sound familiar: “The highest benefits people identified were time saver, brainstorming and improved operational efficiency. Privacy concern was the top challenge, followed by lack of training, keeping up with AI changes, ethical issues around using AI, and AI giving incorrect information,” Booke notes, emphasizing that organizations need to decide where AI fits and train accordingly.
That policy lens shows up again in how Booke reads the data: “When I look at the overall data, I would say that most people are not using it and some are just dabbling in it to try and figure it out. But it’s clear that people want to know how to use it properly… and making sure that how you’re using it matches the mission, vision and values of their organization.”
Published March 2026
