In a typical college classroom or study area, displays and TVs have replaced whiteboards and markers as the easiest way for students and professors to share information and collaborate with each other. For a long time, these displays were wired to desks or perhaps a podium at the center of a room. Anyone wishing to share something from a laptop or device had to connect to the display from that one position in the room.
But increasingly, colleges are beginning to experiment with wireless display technology that allows professors and instructors to walk around freely with their devices and lets students share videos and projects with the rest of the class.
If you think about it, this is really just the next logical step. Smartphones and tablets have become so common on campuses that we don?t think twice about seeing students operating one or more devices. Wireless display technology is simply capitalizing on the fact that students and professors have their projects and data on hand, and want to be able to share them quickly and easily.
Wireless display technology offers plenty of benefits that help simplify and enhance the learning experience. WiDi technology eliminates the need for cables, and allows students and instructors to move freely, or stay exactly where they are. There?s no need to change seats or exchange one laptop for another. This in turn reduces expenses for cabling and switch equipment.
But one of the real benefits of WiDi technology is that it improves collaboration and makes it easier than ever for students to share videos, pictures, presentations, and any other information critical to their studies. This is important in the classroom, but other areas like libraries and study rooms can benefit from the same technology. Students gathering together to study can easily compare notes, watch presentations, or collaborate on group projects?without the hassle of constant plugging and unplugging from wired displays. It even gives students and instructors the convenience of dual-screen multitasking. They can now stream a video from their smartphone, and while it?s playing, open email or search the internet.
With WiDi technology, colleges and universities can add another component to the technological innovations that are driving education. At N2N, we understand the complex relationship between technology and the higher education world. More technology can certainly be a boon for colleges, but it can also create problems as more and more apps and systems are added each year. That?s why we?ve created the N2N Integration Cloud specifically for higher education institutions. The NIC integrates all your existing apps and systems, and acts a translator, providing seamless and secure data transfers across all systems. Adding new apps is easy, and the NIC can be scaled up or down depending on the needs of your particular institution.
If you?d like to learn more about the NIC and the intersection of technology and education, contact N2N Services today.
Ask just about any college student what bothers them about their classes, and you?re sure to hear about their textbooks. It?s easy to see why. College textbooks can be incredibly expensive. Some books cost hundreds of dollars, and just one semester?s worth can easily run over a thousand dollars. Books can be bought used, but publishers change editions regularly, making an old textbook a hassle to use. In many cases, students are allowed to rent textbooks, and return them at the end of the semester, but this isn?t always an option, and most students don?t get away unscathed by the prices at the start of each semester.
Many students complain that they bought a book that they hardly used in class, and this leads to college students waiting to buy their books until they?re sure they need them?and already behind in the class. So where do digital textbooks fit into all of this? At first glance, they seem like the ideal solution, but let?s take a closer look and explore the pros and cons of the digital textbook revolution.
Pros
Digital textbooks allow for an interactive learning experience. Many companies offer links to videos and unique source material, and even interactive diagrams and quizzes.
Digital textbooks are also easy to use. Instead of flipping through a four hundred-page book, students can use search features to quickly find what they?re looking for.
They also add the benefit of superior portability. Carrying around four massive textbooks is now as easy as sticking your iPad in your backpack.
One of the most talked about aspects of digital textbooks is the pricing. You might think that digital versions of textbooks would be much cheaper?after all there is no cost for printing or shipping?but unfortunately this isn?t always the case. Combined with the cost of the tablet or e-reader, the price difference can end up being a wash.
Cons
Interactivity is great, but not all digital textbooks come with these features. Some are simply page scans, and many students still prefer books that allow you to use ?cognitive mapping??developing cues to remember where you saw the information in the first place.
Reading on a tablet is also fraught with potential distractions for students. That same tablet holds all their apps and social media that many students prefer not to be tempted by.
It seems that some students also just like the physical aspect of books. Being able to highlight and write directly on paper is preferable for some, and reading on e-readers can interfere with intuitive navigation of the text.
Lastly, while it?s relatively hard to steal a mammoth print textbook from the bookstore, digital piracy of textbooks is a growing concern for publishers. With prices as high as they currently are, it can be tempting for students to illegally download their textbooks.
At N2N, we understand the complex relationship between technology and education, and we?re here to help your institution innovate and flourish. If you?d like to learn more about how Illuminate can push data to mobile devices, dashboards and wearables, contact N2N Services today.
Fitbit for learning, anyone? Imagine a targeted alert system where the student is personally notified when an assignment is due, or when grades have been posted, or when the next big game is scheduled? Imagine a targeted notification system when, for example, the balance on student’s meal plan is under threshold?
SaaSification of education
Most edtech companies will be working on plans to convert?their on-premise/hosted solution to a SaaS model during the year 2016. This trend will continue this year and probably reach a feverish pace during the year 2017.
Personalized learning pathways
Competency Based Education, Game Based Learning and other personalized learning pathways will become mainstream and will continue to transform learning technologies this year.
Future of education, powered by?Integration
At N2N, we are committed to transforming education by solving the systemic integration issues at the core of administrative information systems. N2N’s Integration Platform (now called “Illuminate“) is at the core of our offering to support the future of education. During year 2015, we have entered into?following strategic collaborations to support educational institutions and leading edtech companies
During the year 2016, we are looking to transform learning by deploying our real-time, bi-directional APIs (http://illuminateapp.com/apis/sdoc.jsp) at educational institutions.
Powered by N2N’s API Management platform, N2N’s standardized, student information APIs can be used by educational institutions to achieve the following strategic objectives
Share?Student Data with SaaS providers in a secure fashion using turnkey APIs
Expose Student Data to Wearable, mobile and other devices to send targeted alerts and notifications
Synchronize Student Data between SIS and other third-party applications in a real-time fashion
Summary
N2N has been a strong proponent of collaboration and we have partnered with over 60 educational institutions and several edtech vendors over the years. We will continue this pursuit during the year 2016 to support the future of learning.
Join us to reimagine education during the year 2016.?
Educause recently published their Research Snapshot, Top 10 IT Issues 2016. We?d like to give you N2N?s perspective on some of these important issues, and our thoughts on how our Illuminate platform can help institutions address these areas.
First on the list is Information Security. This is a perennial concern, and is an area that has consistently, and justifiably, been a top issue for IT leaders. Concern is needed, as our interconnected world opens many avenues for malfeasance. N2N?s Illuminate platform can be an asset here, as one of its core value propositions is to make it easier for users to manage data interconnections between applications. Having a central platform with controls for data exchange and logging of transactions helps users understand where and to whom data is moving.
Educause states that technology leaders must work with academic leadership and faculty to Optimize Educational Technology. That is certainly true, and especially so in today?s fast-moving world where an institution?s perceived competitiveness can be tied to its ability to seamlessly integrate its administrative and academic technologies. N2N?s Illuminate platform has out-of-the-box adapters for many popular ed-tech (educational technology) applications, and also creates application programming interfaces to institutional data that can be leveraged by in-house developers.
Student Success Technologies are critical to improve educational outcomes. Leveraging technology means sharing data, and unfortunately, much institutional data is stuck in its own silo, and each time it needs to be provided to a new, innovative application, a customized interface must be written and maintained. N2N?s Illuminate addresses this by leveraging its core Enterprise Service Bus technology to convert a complex web of interconnections and a ?one-to-one? integration philosophy to a ?one-to-many? paradigm, helping an institution to be nimble in its use of changing tools.
Enterprise Application Integrations (#8)?are a key to efficient and effective institutional operations, and are the core value proposition of the N2N Illuminate platform. The Illuminate platform?s ready-to-use adapters for common educational enterprise applications makes it easy to connect legacy systems to its Enterprise Service Bus (ESB). This ?one-to-many? connectivity model allows technical staff to focus on areas where they add unique value to their organization rather than continually building and maintaining a mesh of ?one-off? connections.
It’s been a long time since we relied solely on phone calls and voicemail for communication. We’ve since grown into email, instant messages, conferencing, and video calls. Now there are more ways to get ahold of each other than there ever have been, and it takes certain technological know-how for an employee to juggle all these communications and respond appropriately. And if it’s a hassle for an end user to manage all their communications, then you can bet it isn’t easy for an IT department to deal with these systems in an simple and secure manner.
It may seem like a tough call to make, but unified communications are becoming a necessity for higher education institutions that want to encourage a culture of collaboration and innovation. Video conferencing is increasingly becoming a popular option, especially for schools with satellite campuses that are located miles away.
Imagine a situation when a voice call couldn’t quite communicate the concept at hand. Now imagine an easy solution, as the call switches to video and a visual demonstration allows the person on the other end to fully grasp the concept being presented. This really isn’t a radical idea, and it shouldn’t be a surprise that unified communications are improving collaboration and decision-making at campuses across the country. Voicemails can be accessed from email, documents can be shared remotely, and students can watch a lecture from a campus in another state.
This all sounds fantastic, but how do you integrate a diverse set of applications and systems, and truly unify your communications? At N2N, we’ve created the Illuminate Platform, a strategic and adaptable combination of technologies, starting with a flexible, reliable and secure cloud infrastructure platform. Rather than trying to find that one solution that does everything, the Illuminate platform was designed with the understanding that there is no one system that will address all institutional needs.
Illuminate gives you seamless and secure data transfer across all systems, even legacy and strategic programs that still run locally. It works as a central hub, linking everything together and taking data and transforming it into the format that another application needs. Illuminate is like a highway leading between several cities, bypassing the system of existing roads, ensuring smooth data transactions across applications.
At N2N, we pride ourselves on our educational background and expertise. Higher education institutions are not businesses that can be run like any other corporation. Of course, there are business elements to running a college or university, but at N2N we understand that higher education is about more than business, and we pride ourselves on being able to find solutions that integrate both business and academic applications. That way you can focus on providing your students with the best education possible, instead of your IT structure.
If you would like to know more about how our team and the N2N Illuminate platform can help your college or university, contact N2N Services today.
When you visit our Site, we collect identifiers about you, including your IP address, and use cookies to improve our website performance,
deliver a more personalized experience, and to analyze our traffic. By continuing to browse our site, you accept our Privacy Policy.OkPrivacy Policy
SaaSification of education
