Refreshing the Homepage

For incoming students scrolling through the website for the first time, everything may seem cohesive and familiar — the same maroon-and-white branding, the same programs and facilities. But behind the recognizable colors and pages, Texas A&M Rec Sports spent the spring semester quietly rebuilding its digital front door from the ground up.

“I knew that we were going to have to renovate the website,” said Kelly VonDrehle, assistant director of marketing & communications. “On our previous website, I spent the last two years cleaning up the content and only keeping the information our programs wanted and needed. I also met with groups of students to hear feedback about what they would like to see on the new site.” 

Unlike the previous version, the new website was rebuilt and fully transitioned in four months, from January through April. VonDrehle and her team of student employees led the redesign effort, using lessons learned from the previous site to create a more streamlined and cohesive experience. 

“Although our previous website offered more design flexibility, the standardized settings built into the new Texas A&M website helped create greater consistency throughout,” VonDrehle said. “There was definitely a learning curve, but once we understood the design structure and overall concept, the transition became much smoother.”

Hasini Kavuru ’27, the web assistant for the Marketing & Communications team, and former web assistant Gagan Prathapaneni ’27 played key roles in the redesign process, helping build and organize the site on a condensed timeline.

“I think my favorite part was honestly just watching the website get better step by step and knowing students would actually use it every day,” Kavuru said. “The timeline was super fast, too, so it was a lot of teamwork and quick problem-solving, but that honestly made it more fun. It was really satisfying seeing everything go live after working on it in such a short amount of time.”

Some of the most noticeable updates include a redesigned hours-of-operation page and a reorganized Sport Club page.

“One of the biggest concerns we heard from students was inconsistent hours of operation across the website,” VonDrehle said. “It was a challenge updating the same information on numerous pages almost daily. With the new automated system, students now receive the same consistent hours no matter where they navigate on the website.”

For Kavuru, redesigning the Sport Clubs page required coordinating dozens of moving parts, including compiling information for all 40 sport clubs and individually tagging them. Once the redesign was complete, the website was unveiled to the Student Employee Advisory Committee on April 23.

“Kelly [VonDrehle] unveiled the new website, did a walk-through, and showed us how different things were and how similar things were,” Abigail Simmons ’26 said. “There were a lot of different pathways that lead to the same place, which is very helpful for somebody who’s looking for our website hours, but they’re not coming from the homepage.”

For Simmons, the homepage stood out the most, particularly the hours-of-operation displays and calendars that now pull consistent information across multiple pages. But beyond the functionality, she said the visual presentation of the site left the strongest impression.

“My favorite thing about the new layout is the video when you first open the website because it’s really eye-catching,” Simmons said. “If I were just opening this website for the first time, I would get a really good idea what the Rec has, and it would get me excited.”

Simmons also serves as the graphic design manager for Rec Sports Marketing & Communications, where she designed several graphics featured throughout the website.

“Everything is more streamlined now,” Simmons said. “It’s a lot easier to produce those graphics.”

The redesign process, however, is still evolving. A second round of updates is already underway, as Rec Sports continues gathering student feedback and refining the user experience while maintaining the university’s branding standards.

“We often hear from students that they do not understand the difference between a Strength & Conditioning class and a Fitness & Wellness class,” VonDrehle said. “By organizing classes into broader categories instead of separating them solely by program area, we are providing students with a more accessible and user-friendly experience.”