Information technology (IT) organizations in higher education face a completely different world than they did ten years ago. Some of the core principles on which we have organized higher education and the information technology to support it are now either obsolete or undergoing major transformations. The meaning of “IT” has changed. Students are not who they used to be. The economy has probably changed in permanent ways (beyond a normal recession). Fragmentation and disruption are dividing attention and resources. IT’s stakeholder community is more complex and varied. What do these changes mean for information technology at small liberal arts colleges? In this seminar, Dr. Tom Warger, NITLE Fellow and independent consultant, will outline the changes that are affecting information technology at small liberal arts colleges and their implications for IT staff, library, faculty, students and others.

1. The New Information Technology
Organization for Liberal Arts
Colleges
Thomas A. Warger
NITLE Fellow
November 29, 2012

2. The shot heard around the world…
The early Web radically democratized culture, but
now in the media and elsewhere you’re seeing a
flight to quality. The best American colleges should
be able to establish a magnetic authoritative
presence online.
David Brooks, “The Campus Tsunami,” NYT, May 4, 2012
See also, Ken Auletta, “Get Rich U,” New Yorker, April 30, 2012

3. Is this our choice?
Evolve Transform
Streamline Redefine
Extend Replace
Adapted from Gregory A. Jackson, “Enterprise IT, E-Learning, and Transformation: Prospects in Higher Education.” Educause Review Online

4. A question for you
If your IT group were truly
organized make change
happen, how different
would it look?

5. Staff Percentage by Role
Other 10% Management 12%
User Services 18%
Applications 35%
http://blog.thehigheredc
Infrastructure 25% io.com/2012/10/31/it-
staffing-ratios-
benchmarks/

6. The IT 100
• IT staff • Physical Plant
• Library • Faculty
• Center for Teaching • Student IT staff
• Lab managers • Students at large
• Student Success • HR
• Finance
• Public Safety

7. Second question
• Do you find the IT 100 idea valid? As a goal?
How close to reality? Ways to make it real and
effective?

8. Bass: Disrupting Ourselves
Randall Bass article: http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/disrupting-
ourselves-problem-learning-higher-education

9. Jackson: Drivers of transformation
• Guidance and pedagogy • Privacy and analytics
– Students (and faculty) trying fend for – We have a lot of data about our students.
themselves What are we doing with it?
• Paths and swirl • Complexity and
– On the way to graduation permanence
• Borders and treaties – Digital information runs the risk of
disappearing
– Prospecting widely for students
• Inputs and outputs • Who’s who
– Identity management is a challenge in the
– How do we measure education?
online setting
• Division of responsibility
– When a student has attended multiple
institutions
Gregory A. Jackson article: http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/enterprise-it-e-
learning-and-transformation-prospects-higher-education

10. Cues from the landscape
Doubts and Diverging Views
On the value of higher education
New Alignments of Priorities
IT needs to address the most urgent issues an institution has.
Change, This Time
The economic crisis will not just ago away.
Know the IT Mandate
Is the CIO at the big table?
A Higher Standard of Accountability
Metrics and proof
See Warger article: http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/surveying-landscape

11. Be the change…
And all along we’ve prescribed a single
response to ensure that when the dust
settles, you’ll still have a viable business:
Develop a disruption of your own before it’s
too late to reap the rewards of participation
in new high growth markets.
Maxwell Wessel and Clayton M. Christensen, “Surviving Disruption,” Harvard Business
Review, December 2012.

12. Recommended
1. Replace Yourself: Where can we replace ourselves in
higher ed, before someone else does it for us?
2. Service Tomorrow: Do we have a good idea how
education will be constructed, delivered and consumed in
the future?
3. Experience, Not Technology: How can we in higher ed
focus on the experience of learning, as opposed to the
delivery mechanism?
4. Be Fearless: How can we be more fearless in higher ed,
and be willing to take risks for our students?
5. Design For Your Customer: Are we in higher ed offering
enough choices for how our students' want consume and
participate in learning?
What do you think Netflix streaming can teach us in
higher ed?
Joshua, Kim, Inside Higher Ed
http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/technology_and_learning/5_things_netflix_streaming_can_teach_higher_ed#ixzz2BbZf4WR9

13. Time to discuss
• Use the WebEx “chat” window.
• Rebecca will call out the questions for me.
• I will reply in writing to any questions we
don’t get to here online.
• And, twarger@nitle.org