EduCause: Is your IT Strategy up to it?

8am session entitled "Is Your Strategic Plan Ready for the Latest Innovation?"

Premise is:  "New trends challenge our campuses' strategic plans almost every day. Big data, MOOCs, flipped classrooms, BYOD, responsive design, and the cloud necessitate solutions as well as agile and dynamic responses from the IT department. Hear how a panel of experts tackles these and other challenges with innovative technology backed by strong strategic plans"

Panel members here:  https://www.educause.edu/annual-conference/2014/your-strategic-plan-ready-latest-innovation

DB -  Deborah Burak, CIO, Northampton Community College

DM - David Monchusie, CIO, Park University

There is a session later on wearable technologies - which might be a nice segway.

First, plaudits to the only IT manager in a group of about 50 who said he didn't allow BYOD.  Not that I agree with him.

DB:  "Student success is a key thread through our plan"

DB: "New president focused on a new college strategic plan with 5 focuses.  Student outreach, Student completion, diversity and global engagment, community engagement, leadership in technology"  "Tech focus:  Infrastructure, innovation labs, MOOCs, assessment, flipped classrooms, emerging tech.  Early alert system for failing students, responsive design for the web"

Early alert systems might need more focus in our strategic plan - dividends are obvious.

DB: "Innovation labs - all new tech, gold LEED certified, additional monitors, mobile pieces, be prepared to scale up, small changes in a room"  

Two monitors in more of our Open Access areas might be helpful - not sure what we can do on mobile? 

DB: "We made big use of feedback, surveys to understand what students thought"

DB: "Flipped classrooms, make sure Faculty involved, Teaching and Learning round table - been a good place to facilitate innovation"  

Strikes me that we ought to be coming up with great ideas for how tech can be used to push us forward.  We can sometimes operate more like an inhibitor.

DB: "All projects need to be aligned to the 5 strategic focuses"

DM: "New president focused on student success, strengthen brand, customer service effectiveness, optimise use of technology, strengthen fiscal position"

DM: "tech focus:  Direct new efforts and resources, innocative delivery, expand global markets, analytics and big data"

DM: "Board of governers very tech savvy and are supportive"  "Data and metrics needs to be a focus"

DM: "focus on delivering core values and product"  "It comes down to access anytime anywhere to any device - this is what drive us"

DM: "You've got to have a strong network.  We put in an MPLS circuit to mesh us together"  "many of these places are military and remote - which was a challenge"

This isn't so much of a  problem for us - with JANET and our 2x10gbit inter-campus links

DM: "virtualisation is a key focus, offering virtual desktops everywhere to provide access to what students need wherever they are"

DM: "analytics, big data, comes from anywhere.  How do we put it all together?  Do we have the smarts in house?  We're making use of our partners to get this right, using a data warehouse.  Cognos at the front end."

We do have a range of data that could drive us perhaps a little harder than we're going.

Similarities between both strategies include - student success and analytics.

So, on to innovative technologies.

"Cloud based, Teradata really helped to - inexpensive"
Timetrade - "great scheduling cloud tool."

http://www.timetrade.com/

"Has made a massive difference to our interview scheduling."

DM: "How do you prevent 'white elephant' tech - i.e. not used.  Start with Faculty and allow them to drive forward".   "Get out there and partner with your student government"

Our Faculty learning technologists are key here.

DS: "Use readiness for technology adoption framework.  Started at the top and worked down"  "Used clickers to gauge and elicit opinion"

What were the challenges?

DM: "You won't get it right first time - with the innovation labs, we met with the academics later, emphasising a pilot approach, get feedback and be prepared to change"   "helps to scale"  "We have limited resources - how to you balance this? get backing from customers, stakeholders"

DS: "How do you do more with less?  Virtualisation is one way to get this out there.  BYOD is a good way to manage costs - staff, students bring their own end devices."