From the Editor
Technology in Higher Education
Anne Wujcik — Friday, November 04, 2011
I received two e-mails from long-time colleagues this past week, both dealing with the higher ed market. The first came from Casey Green, director of The Campus Computing Project, the largest continuing study of computing, eLearning and information technology in American higher education. Casey is one of the leading experts on higher ed information technology and when I actively covered higher ed was always high on my list of people to consult when I needed to understand campus technology trends or policies. The second message came from Peter Grunwald, founder and President of Grunwald Associates. Many of you know Peter from various aspects of the work his firm does on media and technology, including the annual PBS K-12 Education Technology Survey. Peter wanted to alert me that EDUCAUSE had just released a report and infographic that his company developed based on a survey of student technology use and attitudes. The infographic is a great visual depiction of the research highlights.
The 2011 Campus Computing Survey is based on survey data provided by senior campus IT officials, typically, the CIO, CTO, or other senior campus IT officer, representing 496 two- and four-year public and private/non-profit colleges and universities across the United States.
Though higher education budgets are still tight, it appears that there has been some slight easing over the past year. Roughly a third (36%) of colleges and universities experienced a budget cut in central IT services for the current academic year, down from 42% last year and 50% in fall 2009. Over 40% of public four-year colleges (44%) reported budget cuts for central IT services for fall 2011, compared to 46% a year ago and 57% in fall 2009. Two-fifths (39%) of community colleges experienced cuts in their budget for central IT services for the current academic year, compared to 46% in 2010 and 37% in fall 2009.
The higher ed Learning Management (LMS) market is increasingly competitive. Blackboard's share (including Angel and WebCT) fell to 51% in 2011, compared to 57% last year and down from 71% in fall 2006. Blackboard's major LMS competitors - Desire2Learn, Moodle, and Sakai - all gained share. New LMS providers, including Epsilen, Instructure, and Loudcloud, among others, are also generating significant interest and beginning to sign some interesting campus clients.
Senior campus IT officers remain bullish on the future of eBooks. Nine-tenths (90%) of the survey participants agree or strongly agree that "eBook content will be an important source for instructional resources in five years," up from 87% in 2010 and 76% in 2009. More than four-fifths (82%) agree that "eBook readers (hardware) will be important platforms for instructional content in five years."
The survey documented big gains in the proportion of campuses that have activated mobile apps. More than half (55%) of public universities have activated mobile apps as of fall 2011 or will do so in the coming academic year, compared to a third (33%) in fall 2010; public four-year colleges also posted good gains (44% in 2011, up from 18% in fall 2010) while the numbers more than tripled among community colleges (41% this year vs. 12% last fall).
"Several factors explain these dramatic gains," says Green. "Colleges and universities are playing catch-up with the consumer experience. Students come to campus expecting to use mobile apps on their smartphones and tablets to navigate campus resources and use campus services. Also important is that compared to a year ago, more firms - both LMS and ERP providers - now offer mobile options for their campus clients."
Find more details at http://www.campuscomputing.net/item/campus-computing-2011-big-gains-going-mobile
Grunwald Associates' EDUCAUSE survey gathered responses from a nationally representative sample of 3,000 students in 1,179 colleges and universities. In addition to student technology use, the survey also explored undergraduate views on how -- and how well -- their institutions are integrating technology.
College students have a clear preference for smart, mobile devices (nearly nine in 10 students own laptops, more than half own smartphones, and one in 10 owns a netbook or an iPad (8%) or other tablet (2%), but a majority of students are still attached to "standard issue" technology, such as printers (81%) and desktop computers (53%), as well. Devices are used for a number of purposes, but education is prime: 70% of students who own a netbook, and 67% of students who own an iPad or another tablet, use these devices for academic activities. In addition, 57% of all students use e-books or e-textbooks, which lend themselves to these devices.
Other than core communication tools (e-mail, text messaging, and Facebook), word processing, presentation, and spreadsheet software are the most frequently used applications for academic or personal purposes, along with the institutional library website and course or learning management system.
Many of the software applications and activities students most value academically are among those they wish instructors used more often. These include e-mail, content or learning management systems, e-books or e-textbooks, presentation software, online forums or bulletin boards, college/university websites, word processors, text messages, spreadsheets, and wikis.
The technologies most used by instructors in the classroom are projectors (69%), laptops (67%), desktop computers (65%), Wi-Fi (44%) and printers (42%) are also the technologies that students believe their instructors use most effectively.
Fifty-five percent of students agree that their instructors use technology effectively compared to 12% who disagree. Fifty-seven percent agree that their instructors use technology frequently enough, compared to 11% who disagree. And 46% percent agree that technology is seamlessly integrated into their courses, compared to 15% who disagree.
More students (36%) prefer a blended learning environment of seminars and other smaller classes with some online components to any other configuration of face-to-face and online options. Students also say that they tend to learn more in classes with online components-both in seminars and smaller classes (44%) and in large lecture classes (13%).
The complete report can be downloaded at http://www.grunwald.com/reports/.
Thanks to Casey and Peter for sharing.
