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According to Patton, human resource departments tend to be one of the last areas within higher education to adopt new technologies. Over the past few years vendors have begun developing new products based on college and university needs, especially in the human resource area.  Most human resource departments have an enterprise resource planning system (ERP) or a Human Resource Information System (HRIS), which is used in conjunction with compatible, or sometimes not-compatible, vendor services. SunGard continues to offer more and more human resource services, including an effort certification system, which monitors and collects data on how many hours certain employees are spending on research, if their salary is paid through a grant. In the mid 2010s, SunGard and PeopleSoft partnered to create an applicant tracking system that offered three programs in one: a position description model, a performance management module, and an applicant-tracking model. While some improvements have been made, human resource departments need to embrace the new technologies, and utilize the offered services in the front of the office, as well as the back. Most of the examples within the article are large, state universities, such as Florida Atlantic University, Oklahoma City Community College, and the University of Utah. Duke University is mentioned, however, Duke is a large, elite university with more financial resources than most other private institutions. The question remaining is if the cost of human resource modules are justified at smaller institutions? Hopefully the future will bring options to colleges and universities with a few hundred employees, rather than a thousand. 

The article serves two purposes for research on the topic of higher ed information technology: 1) the challenges associated with managing campus IT are universal; the issues are not found only in American higher education and 2) a case study for exploration of solutions for campus IT problems including cost, adoption and oversight, or management. The recency of the publication is important for context on current trends and issues as well as current management strategies. The sources is important because the authors are economics professors at universities in the UK who are working toward an openness in education agenda, an issue that is often met with resistance in the US even though it is commonly regarded as a possible solution for some IT problems. Openness in education has been widely debated in consideration of three key areas: cost, quality, and access. Open education resources (OER) includes free or low cost textbooks, lab manuals, learning objects and courseware. These options offer resources to educators and students at a lower cost than publisher materials and vendor software, however faculty and others question the quality of resources that are offered for free. The myth that "free" does not equal "good" in the eyes of academics prohibits widespread adoption of OER thus limits access to education resources for many. The case study in this paper goes much deeper, to examine the issues relating to creating an openness initiative at a major university and evaluate the strategies used to shift the campus mindset in regards to OER, change behavior for selecting campus and course resources, and open a dialog around OER, both using and creating from and for the OER community. Bonus: excellent lit review on the topic of openness in higher ed.

TEDI - teaching and educational development institute in Australia. Interesting resource connecting instruction to technology application. Unique perspective - more out-of-the box stuff.

the mother of clearinghouses -  universal design (and UDL) and accessibility in higher education.  

Ben Showers, the author, admits to keeping the projections optimistic, and avoiding the issues of privacy, protection, and data shadow.The article describes five changes to mobile technology that will influence higher education into the future. The first change is mobile devices as a platform for learning and courses. Currently, mobile applications are more of a stepping-stone to larger course-management sites. In the future, students will desire actual learning platforms on their mobile device. The second change focuses on mobile realities. Augmented reality on mobile devices now allows the digital world to overlap with the real, physical world. Higher education institutions are able to use these new augmented reality technologies to aid students in find resources and information on-campus. The third mobile technology to affect higher education is mobile form. In the future, mobile devices will become more personalized and much smaller. As devices are created within glasses, earpieces, and sensors, higher education will have to adapt to those changes. Mobile scales are the fourth change to mobile technology Showers highlights. Large universities will have the ability to personalize each student's experience, offering an educational concierge service never before imagined. Finally, mobile disconnectedness will influence higher education. As students' lives become infiltrated with information via mobile devices, using the Internet, campuses should offer wifi coldspots. Wifi coldspots will offer students and faculty an opportunity to detach from the online work, taking a break from the academic world. 

The article touches upon topics relevant to all Americans, creating a large audience. Anyone influenced by higher education should be interested in Carlson and Blumenstyk's perspective.  While hype surrounds MOOCs and instructional technologies today, others are arguing for investment in brick and mortar colleges and universities. Patricia McGuire, the president of Trinity Washington University, believes those who stand to profit most from MOOCs and other forms of online education have created most of the hype.  Trinity Washington University is full of students receiving Pell Grants and a sub-standard high school education, students who need face-to-face instruction and tutoring more than most other students.  McGuire and other higher education officials listed in the article argue the online education movement is creating a wider gap between those that can afford an on-campus college experience and those that cannot. Unfortunately those that cannot afford to live on-campus and attend an elite university need the resources offered at brick and mortar institutions the most. While enhancement to teaching and learning may come from the development of online education, MOOCS, and new instruction technologies, an emphasis must be put on making on-campus education affordable. If face-to-face instruction is made inaccessible for most Americans, the country will suffer greatly, mainly by a wide divide between the haves and the have-nots within the working word as well as in higher education.

Julie Phillips, an online instructor for Globe Education Network, shares an extensive list of suggestions for faculty members hoping to incorporate service-learning into an online course. On-ground courses have long included service-learning components at colleges and universities across the country. Over the past decade online programs have grown drastically, but have left the challenge of offering service-learning courses to online learners. Phillips offers a variety of suggestions to assist a faculty member or administrator develop an online course including a service-learning assignment. Below is a list of Phillips' recommendations: - Select an appropriate course - Establish clear expectations - Respond to email/outreach from students and community partners within 24-48 hours - Volunteering should align with course objectives - Identify challenges upfront - Communicate, communicate, communicate - Encourage reflection throughout the course - Listen to student concerns and work through them - Enlist feedback from students and community partners - Allow students to share their experiences - Requirements should be realistic - Never underestimate the power that hands-on experience has on student learning - Incorporate various resources into class to help guide students - Not all community partners are created the same - Get excited!

CEIT - Centre for Educational Innovation and Technology. University of Queensland resource. Multiple areas of important. Some access is limited but provides a very good foundation of their areas of development as applied to ed tech.

The article focuses on the 2012 ECAR Undergraduate Technology Survey results and its implications on higher education. Steven Kolowich, a technology reporter for Insider Higher Education, discusses the results throughout the article, explaining the significant jump in student demand for technology within coursework. ECAR is the research arm of Educaause, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the use of technology in higher education.  The 2012 survey results indicate a spike in student technological demands within the world of higher education. 47% of students in 2010 believed their professors were effectively using technology, which jumped to 68% in 2012. Students are enjoying the use and presentation of technology in the classroom more than ever before.  Of the 10,000 students to participate in the survey, 49% want to see professors use the learning management system more, 57% want to use more open educational resources, 46% want more videos used in coursework, and 55% want more game-based learning. A surprising 70% of the students claim to have used one or more ebooks during their college career. While students want to use more technology within their courses, the students also indicated they desire more training on each technological service or program. Brief instruction at the beginning of a course is not enough.

Edutopia, an organization dedicated to innovating and reforming education, created a video on the integration of technology in education. While the video is geared towards a K-12 audience, the main concepts are relevant to higher education. Resources available through technology should be used to the best of an instructor's ability. Technology should enhance the classroom and lessons. Students take an active role in their learning process while creating projects such as movies and podcasts.  Utilizing technology within education allows students to share their work with the rest of the world. The students are also able to learn at their own pace, master concepts, and move on when all the necessary skills and knowledge have been learned. This is a significant transition from the previous way of learning. Within the video, Edutopia explains "integrating technology with face-to-face teacher time generally produces better academic outcomes than employing either technique alone." The role of the teacher has shifted to a facilitator. Now it is up to colleges, universities, and K-12 schools across the country to integrate technology into the classroom.

Terry Anderson writes a synopsis of the book 'Managing Technology in Higher Education', written by Tony Bates. In his article, Anderson captures the essence of the textbook and provides a summary of the chapter contents. This article is suitable for students and faculty wishing to locate relevant resources related to incorporating technology into learning and pedagogy. Anderson notes that even though Bates has written five texts focused on the realm of technology in distance education, 'managing technological change' moves away from his usual focal point, to embrace every model of higher education. The book begins with a summary of the salient points for the benefit of college presidents who rely on the executive summary for the meat of the matter. Anderson's overview spans the nine chapters of the book. Chapter one provides an outline of technologies used n higher education, while the following two chapters deal with leadership and planning, along with models on course organization. The following two chapters focus on the all-important issues of cost versus student access to colleges, and effectively supporting faculty on incorporating technologies into their teaching processes. In chapter four, Bates cites specific cost figures to support the information provided, thereby offering a fresh change from generic and vague statements about the actual costs of creating or implementing certain technologies, including setting up a web course. The next chapter focuses on human resource support to education technology, and the decision to either centralize or decentralize that support. In other words, whether or not to provide the support from the ranks 'within' or call in outside and professional help. The last chapter is about the gains and losses of incorporating technology into the day-to-day operations of institutions. Anderson concludes by adding that the book will assist decision makers choose the technological models best suited to their institutions

Since 2002, the New Media Consortium has partnered with experts in the field of educational technology, including the Educause Learning Initiative (ELI), to conduct a Delphi study and generate its annual Horizon Report on emerging trends in educational technology. The report, widely considered a respectable analysis of issues and a guide to addressing those issues, is disseminated with a Creative Commons open license for public distribution and consumption. Key themes in the NMC Horizon Report include: Infrastructure, leadership, organizational strategies, teaching and learning, curricular content, and assessment (pg. 4). The framework of the report includes sections on policy, leadership and practice (pg. 6). The report includes references for further reading on every issue presented. The references are evidence of the research conducted by the panelists involved in developing the annual report. Trends are also described as short term, mid term or long term trends, helping the reader estimate the impact of the trends on existing campus IT issues and initiatives. Some of the trends in the 2014 report support trends identified by EDUCAUSE and Gartner, while others are unique. Social media is an issue in the NMC report, but not the others, while assessment strategies using student data and technology are common among all three. The Horizon Report is unique in its daring presentation of topics that challenge conventional thought about higher education. The report predicts a significant threat to higher ed coming from online learning and emerging models of formal education. The report also highlights the power and impact of data - from learning analytics to predictive instructional models - that seem to transfer authority from professors to technology and technologists. There is a lot to consume in the Horizon Report. Analysis can be augmented with blogs and conference proceedings which review the report in part or in whole. Reading the report and supporting re

The author, Dale Niederhauser, provides important commentary on frameworks used to speculate the future of technology in schools. He explains, in brief, how Delphi studies are used by various entities to conduct inquiry and generate ideas from experts. This is important information to consider when assessing resources such as the annual Horizon Reports, published by the New Media Consortium and considered a seminal piece of the emerging technology conversation in both K-12 and higher education. The article appears in a publication of the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE), a world recognized leader in educational technology and aims to help educators understand the historical context in which emerging technology reports are created and delivered.

This blog post can be viewed as a supporting material to aid a reader in understanding the 2014 Horizon Report. Blog authors at Columbia's Center for New media Teaching and Learning review the Horizon Report and summarize its findings along with thoughts for application at Columbia. This summary of the report and insight from a prestigious university may aid a researcher in understanding perspectives on emerging technologies. The value here is in the author's perspective as an educational technology professional who manages campus technology and partners with faculty in adopting emerging tools and resources. He includes examples of past experience in technology adoption alongside thoughts about Columbia's opportunities to adopt new tools. For example, he describes the challenges associated with hybrid and flipped model teaching in response to the Horizon Report's concern for adoption and adaptation to emerging models and technology.

Historical perspective of the higher ed CIO. Examines the role of the CIO approximately 10 years after the job gained a foothold. Important for context on the topic of the role of the higher ed CIO. Information includes survey data about the responsibilities and job duties of the developing role. Value lies in the literature dating back earlier than the date of this publication for more information and a deeper historical perspective. Of note, even then CIOs were concerned about their place within the organization and their professional growth as well as being able to manage campus IT in the future with considerations for rapid growth and adoption by all campus users and commercialization of computing resources. These concerns are present today, in current literature suggesting that ongoing research and inquiry is necessary to ensure the health of the profession. Additionally, the struggle to maintain adequate footing in both the administrative and the academic side of the college was present then as it is today, suggesting that the CIO is truly unique in comparison to other "C" level positions.

This video archive presents a point/counterpoint debate of the challenges and opportunities afforded a campus CIO. Issues discussed include: the cost of and shrinking budgets for campus IT; service and support for students and faculty users; managing emerging technology, such as Second Life virtual worlds; and professional development for CIOs. Both panelists agree that a CIO needs to be both a strategist and a plumber, but this agreement is not reached until the conclusion. Value in this resource are the issues presented and frank and sometimes humorous discourse between the two CIOs. The debate occurred when campuses were battling increased use of technologies by all stakeholders and decreased budgets due to the global economic crisis. The viewpoints reflect that challenging time and serves as a basis for evaluation of CIO ability to manage effectively in a crisis when technology use cannot be curbed by budget cuts.

This focus paper describes in detail the Personal Learning Environment (PLE) that was launched at Graz University of Technology in 2010. The context of Web 2.0 and how current learners are using technology is explained. The author demonstrates how browser-based widgets were used to change the appearance of multiple personal desktops, creating a "ubiquitous" personal learning environment (UPLE) that can be used in the future, similar to the appearance of apps on a smartphone device. This article describes how spaces help learners to organize their learning resources via widgets, making connections to how they operate in their natural learning environments outside of the academic realm. Based on the article, using technologies which mimic those that students already use seems important for faculty and administrators to consider when deciding how to best approach implementing personal learning environments. The author is a Doctoral student in the Social Learning, Information Technology Services at Graz University of Technology in Austria.

The authors of this study are two faculty members from New Zealand who sought to improve the standard of writing for their students in their first-year courses for undecided students. They describe at length how they used similar ways to improve the students' literacy skills. The faculty focused specifically on discipline-specific writing skills by engaging the students in their digital literacy skills through course assignments and group projects. This research would be helpful to use as a guideline for faculty teaching in undergraduate disciplines who are interested in learning how best engage students by tapping into their technology skills and familiarity with using online resources. The authors point to a need for supporting the unique journey students experience through their online social interactions as well as designing the online course assignments based on an initial assessment of student learning profiles.