Colleges and universities are running out of closet space. With the amount of data predicted to grow 800 percent by 2016, higher education faces a desperate race to develop strategies to store and manage the tidal wave of information. Unfortunately, many IT departments, particularly those in the public sector, have flatlining budgets--and no money…

Being a college CIO these days must feel a bit like juggling chain saws with one hand while holding a donation cup in the other. It's unlikely to end well, yet it represents the new normal in IT. While campus clients--from administrators to faculty and students--expect the usual raft of tech services, the IT budget simply can't deliver. In this…

As faculty members add online and multimedia elements to their courses, colleges and universities across the country are realizing that there is a lot of work to be done to ensure that disabled students (and employees) have equal access to course material and university websites. Unfortunately, far too few schools consider the task a top priority.…

With their budgets under increasing pressure, many campus IT directors are considering open source projects for the first time. On the face of it, the savings can be significant. Commercial emergency-planning software can cost upward of six figures, for example, whereas the open source Kuali Ready might run as little as $15,000 per year when…

IT's tough being a digital sign these days. Everyone wants a piece of action. From announcements to advertisements, menus to broadcasts, digital signs provide dynamic messaging tailored to locations and circumstances. With the advent of wayfinding technology, today's digital signs can serve up customized directions around campuses and all of…

This column explores the world of Gene, a composite CIO who leads a sizable IT organization for a top 100 university somewhere in America. The author's goal is to help him navigate the tough times ahead of higher education IT. The author peeks into Gene's daily goings-on, investigates his problems, and helps him to not only survive, but prosper.

More than ever, faculty and students are working jointly on documents sharing screens in class, swapping course materials and taking their collective pulse through polls. Nevertheless, many faculty members complain that technical support for group projects is lagging on campus, leaving them searching for solutions elsewhere. While some faculty…

In September, the University of Maryland jumped on the Massive Online Open Course (MOOC) bandwagon, inking an agreement with Coursera to provide the fledgling startup with five online courses. When the first UMD course went live in January, the university joined more than 30 other leading schools that are offering courses for free as part of the…

For any institution looking to shift enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems to the cloud, big savings can be achieved--but only if the school has properly prepped "before" negotiations begin. These three steps can help: (1) Mop up the mess first; (2) Understand the true costs for services; and (3) Calculate the cost of transition.

Air-traffic controller might be a relaxing second career for anyone who's coordinated IT operations at a large research university. Just ask administrators at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. As at most big universities, IT operations on the academic side are decentralized on a major scale. When a faculty member in one of Michigan's 19…

"Tuning the blend" is a phrase that educators hear a lot these days. It refers to finding the correct balance of online activities and face-to-face instruction in hybrid--or blended--courses. Finding a mix that meets the needs of both faculty and students requires experimentation, experience, and constant tweaking. And, as with coffee, the same…

It's a dangerous world out there, with IT shops hard pressed to protect their institutions and users. "Campus Technology" looks at the 4 biggest security worries--and how IT can fight back. In 2012, 61 educational institutions reported data breaches, involving more than 2 million records, according to the nonprofit Identity Theft…

Stanford University (CA) is MOOC Central. While the school may not have launched the first massive open online course (MOOC), its efforts have propelled the concept to the forefront of higher education in a matter of months. Starting with Sebastian Thrun's Introduction to Artificial Intelligence course, which enrolled 160,000 students, Stanford…

There is a civil war simmering in classrooms nationwide. Arrayed on one side are students who would sooner cut off an arm than sacrifice their mobile devices. On the other stand faculty members who expect to be the focal point of their classes and will not abide distractions. Caught in the crossfire are instructional technology professionals.…

Ten years ago, integrating videoconferencing into a college course required considerable effort on the part of the instructor and IT support staff. Today, video- and web-conferencing tools are more sophisticated. Distance education has morphed from audio- and videocassettes featuring talking heads to a more interactive experience with greater…