The Harvard-Westlake athletics department released a new HW Athletics App which will allow members of the community to track their favorite Wolverine players and teams.
“What we’re finding is that in order to engage with our community, we have to understand trends,” Athletic Director Jason Kelly said. “People don’t go to websites anymore and some social medias are kind of passé. But what we do know is that everyone is carrying a cellphone. If we don’t have a mobile strategy, then the ways that we are communicating are not reaching everyone.”
The app was developed in partnership with the digital platform REPu. Currently, the app only offers program pages for the 2018 fall and winter sports, with spring sports coming soon. Each program page has tabs for each of the teams in the program and their individual schedules, rosters, media, news and social media pages. Individual athletes also have profiles with statistics including height, weight and position.
“We have an incredibly wide catalog of sports media, but it’s all over the place,” Kelly said. “With the development of the app, we are able to centralize all of our communications.”
The app also connects users with livestreams, HWTV and Chronicle podcasts. Additionally, media contributed to the app, such as photos and news stories, can be tagged to the appropriate team and athlete profiles after Kelly grants the contributor permission.
“One of the really cool things is the community can now engage in uploading photographs,” Kelly said. “Athletic directors, coaches, assistant coaches, parents and students can now contribute to the app with any kind of media.”
The Athletic Department is excited about the app’s potential and the community has also expressed its interest. Kelly said that as of press deadline there are already more than 800 users.
“The feedback has been awesome from parents, coaches and administrators,” Kelly said. “Everybody who has been using the app has really loved it.”
The app is currently available for download on the Apple App Store and Google Play.
