I am pasting the appropriate portion here as the only available copy is in pdf and we don't need the entire document anyway.
"Significant Challenges Any discussion of technology adoption must also consider important constraints and challenges, and the advisory board drew deeply from a careful analysis of current events, papers, articles, and similar sources, as well as from personal experience, in detailing a long list of challenges higher education institutions face in adopting any new technology. Several important challenges are detailed below, but it was clear that behind them all was a pervasive sense that individual organizational constraints are likely the most important factors in any decision to adopt - or not to adopt - a given technology. Even institutions that are eager to adopt new technologies may be critically constrained by the lack of necessary human resources and the financial wherewithal to realize their ideas. Still others are located within buildings that simply were not designed to provide the radio frequency transparency that wireless technologies require, and thus find themselves shut out of many potential technology options. While acknowledging that local barriers to technology adoptions are many and significant, the advisory board focused its discussions on challenges that are common to the higher education community as a whole. The highest ranked challenges they identified are listed here, in the order in which the advisory board ranked them. 1 Economic pressures and new models of education are bringing unprecedented competition to the traditional models of higher education. Across the board, institutions are looking for ways to control costs while still providing a high quality of service. Institutions are challenged by the need to support a steady - or growing - number of students with fewer resources and staff than before. As a result, creative institutions are developing new models to serve students, such as streaming introductory courses over the network. As these pressures continue, other models may emerge that diverge from traditional ones. Simply capitalizing on new technology, however, is not enough; the new models must use these tools and services to engage students on a deeper level. 2 Appropriate metrics of evaluation lag the emergence of new scholarly forms of authoring, publishing, and researching. Traditional approaches to scholarly evaluation, such as citation-based metrics, are often hard to apply to research that is disseminated or conducted via social media. New forms of peer review and approval, such as reader ratings, inclusion in and mention by influential blogs, tagging, incoming links, and re-tweeting, are arising from the natural actions of the global community of educators, with increasingly relevant and interesting results. These forms of scholarly Executive Summary 5 corroboration are not yet well understood by mainstream faculty and academic decision-makers, creating a gap between what is possible and what is acceptable. 3 Digital media literacy continues its rise in importance as a key skill in every discipline and profession. Despite the widespread agreement on the importance of digital media literacy, training in the supporting skills and techniques is rare in teacher education and non-existent in the preparation of most university faculty. As lecturers and professors begin to realize that they are limiting their students by not helping them to develop and use digital media literacy skills across the curriculum, the lack of formal training is being offset through professional development or informal learning, but we are far from seeing digital media literacy as an expected norm for academic professionals, nor as a key part of degree programs. 4 Institutional barriers present formidable challenges to moving forward in a constructive way with emerging technologies. Too often it is education's own processes and practices that limit broader uptake of new technologies. Much resistance to change is simply comfort with the status quo, but in other cases, such as in promotion and tenure reviews, experimentation with or adoptions of clearly innovative applications of technologies is often seen as outside the role of researcher or scientist. 5 New modes of scholarship are presenting significant challenges for libraries and university collections, how scholarship is documented, and the business models to support these activities. While the university library has traditionally housed collections of scholarly resources, social networks and new publishing paradigms, such as open content, are challenging the library's role as curator. Students and educators are increasingly able to access important, historic research in web browsers on devices of their choosing. As such, libraries are under tremendous pressure to evolve new ways of supporting and curating scholarship. These trends and challenges are a reflection of the impact of technology that is occurring in almost every aspect of our lives. They are indicative of the changing nature of the way we communicate, access information, connect with peers and colleagues, learn, and even socialize. Taken together, they provided the advisory board a frame through which to consider the potential impacts of nearly 50 emerging technologies and related practices that were analyzed and discussed for possible inclusion in this edition of the NMC Horizon Report series. Six of those were chosen through successive rounds of ranking; they are summarized below and detailed in the main body of the report." - 2012 Horizon Report Higher Education Edition, pgs. 5-6 by New Media Consortium and Educause
"Significant Challenges
Any discussion of technology adoption must also
consider important constraints and challenges, and the
advisory board drew deeply from a careful analysis of
current events, papers, articles, and similar sources, as
well as from personal experience, in detailing a long
list of challenges higher education institutions face
in adopting any new technology. Several important
challenges are detailed below, but it was clear that
behind them all was a pervasive sense that individual
organizational constraints are likely the most important
factors in any decision to adopt - or not to adopt - a
given technology.
Even institutions that are eager to adopt new
technologies may be critically constrained by the
lack of necessary human resources and the financial
wherewithal to realize their ideas. Still others are
located within buildings that simply were not designed
to provide the radio frequency transparency that
wireless technologies require, and thus find themselves
shut out of many potential technology options. While
acknowledging that local barriers to technology
adoptions are many and significant, the advisory board
focused its discussions on challenges that are common
to the higher education community as a whole. The
highest ranked challenges they identified are listed
here, in the order in which the advisory board ranked
them.
1 Economic pressures and new models of education
are bringing unprecedented competition to the
traditional models of higher education. Across the
board, institutions are looking for ways to control costs
while still providing a high quality of service. Institutions
are challenged by the need to support a steady - or
growing - number of students with fewer resources
and staff than before. As a result, creative institutions
are developing new models to serve students, such as
streaming introductory courses over the network. As
these pressures continue, other models may emerge
that diverge from traditional ones. Simply capitalizing
on new technology, however, is not enough; the new
models must use these tools and services to engage
students on a deeper level.
2 Appropriate metrics of evaluation lag the
emergence of new scholarly forms of authoring,
publishing, and researching. Traditional approaches to
scholarly evaluation, such as citation-based metrics, are
often hard to apply to research that is disseminated or
conducted via social media. New forms of peer review
and approval, such as reader ratings, inclusion in and
mention by influential blogs, tagging, incoming links,
and re-tweeting, are arising from the natural actions of
the global community of educators, with increasingly
relevant and interesting results. These forms of scholarly
Executive Summary 5
corroboration are not yet well understood by mainstream
faculty and academic decision-makers, creating a gap
between what is possible and what is acceptable.
3 Digital media literacy continues its rise in
importance as a key skill in every discipline
and profession. Despite the widespread agreement
on the importance of digital media literacy, training in
the supporting skills and techniques is rare in teacher
education and non-existent in the preparation of most
university faculty. As lecturers and professors begin
to realize that they are limiting their students by not
helping them to develop and use digital media literacy
skills across the curriculum, the lack of formal training
is being offset through professional development or
informal learning, but we are far from seeing digital
media literacy as an expected norm for academic
professionals, nor as a key part of degree programs.
4 Institutional barriers present formidable
challenges to moving forward in a constructive
way with emerging technologies. Too often it is
education's own processes and practices that limit
broader uptake of new technologies. Much resistance
to change is simply comfort with the status quo, but in
other cases, such as in promotion and tenure reviews,
experimentation with or adoptions of clearly innovative
applications of technologies is often seen as outside the
role of researcher or scientist.
5 New modes of scholarship are presenting
significant challenges for libraries and university
collections, how scholarship is documented, and the
business models to support these activities. While the
university library has traditionally housed collections of
scholarly resources, social networks and new publishing
paradigms, such as open content, are challenging the
library's role as curator. Students and educators are
increasingly able to access important, historic research
in web browsers on devices of their choosing. As such,
libraries are under tremendous pressure to evolve new
ways of supporting and curating scholarship.
These trends and challenges are a reflection of the
impact of technology that is occurring in almost every
aspect of our lives. They are indicative of the changing
nature of the way we communicate, access information,
connect with peers and colleagues, learn, and even
socialize. Taken together, they provided the advisory
board a frame through which to consider the potential
impacts of nearly 50 emerging technologies and related
practices that were analyzed and discussed for possible
inclusion in this edition of the NMC Horizon Report series.
Six of those were chosen through successive rounds of
ranking; they are summarized below and detailed in the
main body of the report." - 2012 Horizon Report Higher Education Edition, pgs. 5-6 by New Media Consortium and Educause
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