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.
At N2N, our motto is “connect anything to anything,” and we are constantly leading the pack when it comes to higher education systems integration. Providing colleges and universities with a solution that interconnects their disparate data systems has always been our goal, and we’ve developed our Integration Cloud platform, called Illuminate, to do just that. Illuminate takes each data source and integrates them securely and affordably. But we want to keep pushing the boundaries of what our technology can do for higher education. We want to extend this data connectivity with a rich, in-depth, and interactive mobile application.
That’s why we’ve teamed up with Modo Labs. Together, we intend to provide a truly stunning mobile solution that allows students to connect to their financial data, course work, grades, and other information, while at the same time empowering them to interact with their teachers, advisors, tutors, and other campus activities. This innovative new platform is the product of collaboration between our Illuminate date engine and Modo Lab’s Kurogo, a mobile app assembly platform.
So who are Modo Labs, and why is this partnership so transformative for higher
education? Based out of Cambridge, MA, Modo Labs provides a complete mobile solution that empowers ordinary people to create their own applications. These types of mobile capabilities used to only be the domain of mobile developers and expensive consultants. Now, Modo Labs Kurogo Platform gives non-developers an outstanding app assembly system with powerful mobile implementation and development capabilities. The secret is in Kurogo’s combination of data access, pre-built functionality, and ease of use. Today, creating mobile apps for campus is no longer out of reach for non-technical staff or business owners.
And how does this platform fit in with N2N’s Illuminate data engine? Well, the combination of the two allows a massive simplification in the mobile app building process. Illuminate integrates and allows access to the multitude of different data sources in a university system, while Kurogo quickly and easily mobilizes them into a well-developed mobile experience.
Stewart Elliot, Modo Labs CEO said, “We are excited to partner with N2N Services. The combination of the two platforms makes it easier than ever for Universities to provide the comprehensive mobile experience that students expect. Students will be able to easily accomplish even more important tasks on their mobile phones, including the ability to perform direct transactions in virtually any student information system, such as class registration, yet do so as part of an advanced, interactive and rich mobile experience.”
This combination of higher education technology is a major development for colleges and universities around the country. At N2N, we understand the importance of easy-to-use technology in campus life. Today’s students are used to instant access and in-depth mobile apps. Our partnership with Modo Labs provides these institutions with the best of both worlds: secure enterprise data access, and an unsurpassed front-end mobile experience.
If you would like to hear more about our partnership with Modo Labs, and how your college can benefit, contact N2N Services today.
“N2N Services, Inc., a leading platform provider for Higher Education systems integration, andModo Labs, a Cambridge, MA based provider of the leading mobile engagement and campus platform for universities and enterprises, announced a partnership that will deliver an innovative mobile application technology solution to institutions of higher learning. With this partnership, N2N Services and Modo Labs will give their clients and the marketplace a comprehensive, secure and affordable platform to integrate disparate data systems, and extend this data connectivity with a beautiful, rich and interactive mobile application.” Read the rest of our press release here.
Today, students are used to accessing data and resources via mobile platforms anytime and anywhere, and they don’t care to know the inner workings of the systems. The Modo Labs and N2N partnership allows the students to access their enterprise resources, campus feeds and critical information securely through their mobile device, stated Kiran Kodithala, CEO and President of N2N Services. Students, Administrators and Faculty at campuses have been looking for a comprehensive mobile app that they can use for student engagement and student success. This partnership gives institutions of higher education the best of all worlds. While N2N provides secure enterprise data access, Modo Labs offers the best-of-breed front-end mobile experience that makes it possible to quickly leverage that data on any device.
This partnership allows students to access their enterprise resources, campus feeds and critical information securely through their mobile devices. Students, administrators and faculty have been looking for a comprehensive mobile app that they can use to engage students and give them the tools and information they need to succeed. This partnership gives institutions of higher education the best of all worlds; N2N provides enterprise data access while Modo Labs provides the rich, easy-to-use and impressive front-end experience.
College and university CIOs face all sorts of complex issues when it comes to successfully meeting application, technology, and user base demands.
As developments in the tech world continue ever onwards, CIOs will face numerous challenges if they want to successfully integrate and operate the digital environments of their campuses.
New Trends
Business Analytics: More than ever, CIOs need to develop and provide useful data for both students and administrators. In order to retain students and improve their education outcomes, CIOs are using learning and predictive analytics as well as data-driven decision making.
Mobile Apps: Colleges and universities are now coming under pressure to provide mobile applications for their students that offer new and intuitive connectivity on a student-to-student and student-to-educator basis. A recent national survey has shown that 83 percent of higher education campuses are activating mobile apps or planning to for 2015 and beyond.
Cloud Services: Providing user support for cloud services is another huge new endeavor for CIOs to tackle. In keeping up with the trend of tech development, cloud integration is now a necessary structure for CIOs to master themselves and make available to their administrative staff and students.
Campus Wi-Fi: As the proliferation of smart wireless devices increases year after year, institutions are struggling to provide the adequate bandwidth to accommodate all the devices students carry. The same national survey mentioned above showed that 74 percent of CIOs ranked providing appropriate wireless networking a top priority.
New Tech: New tools and toys are the name of the game year-to-year when it comes to technological innovation. For instance, wearable devices open up a new frontier in educational opportunities. Quizzes, campus navigation, and interactive lessons will make use of these devices, and CIOs must ensure their digital infrastructures are well-equipped to accommodate them. But security will also prove a major issue in this area ? especially as the ?Internet of Things? develops into the future.
Biggest Challenges
Operational Strategies: Staffing IT departments on college and university campuses is of utmost importance for CIOs if they want to keep their systems running at full capacity. A 2014 survey on these campuses across the US showed that two-thirds of CIOs had succession planning strategies, and 71 percent reported having formal IT governance strategies.
Budget Concerns: Allocating funds to central, academic, and administrative IT proves a major challenge to CIOs, especially when only 33 percent (according to the survey) of respondents expected their IT budgets to increase by next year.
Data Collection and Reporting: Most CIOs report using internal service providers for data management. In other words, CIOs will more than likely be responsible for overseeing the strategies of how to support and maintain the updates and maintenance of their likely multiple data center environments.
Higher education is on a path toward a worldwide technological revolution that will completely change the way we look at learning and the systems that provide it.
For both public and private institutions, these new trends and challenges will be front and center in your mind as a CIO for the rest of 2015 and as we transition into 2016. Stay up to date on these developments, and you should be prepared to overcome any IT obstacles you face.
And remember ? N2N?s integration cloud can help you streamline processes at your university and easily move data that way you need to. To learn more, contact us today by emailing info@n2nservices.com.
If you?ve worked in IT for any length of time, especially in the field of higher education, then you know that it wasn?t too long ago that CIOs had a very different job.
There was no cloud. There was no SaaS. There were no smartphones and tablets, and no wifi.
There were on-campus email servers to worry about. There was software to install, and hardware to purchase. There were updates to perform manually, and emergency maintenance to be done when something went wrong.
But as technology has evolved, so has the role of the CIO. No longer saddled with maintaining a massive on-campus computing infrastructure, CIOs in higher ed today have more time to focus on innovation, vision, and strategy in their schools? use of technology. More time to work out how best to utilize tech to support the mission of their institutions ? namely, the success of their students. And more time to think about and prepare their schools for whatever disruptive new developments may emerge in the future.
But planning for the future is no mean feat, considering the tendency of new technology to take a completely different direction from the one predicted. After all, while the experts were all promising us flying cars (I used to watch The Jetsons and think I’d never drive a car with wheels!) and hoverboards, the internet was quietly being developed.
So what?s a CIO to do? The way we see it, there are three parts to a prudent, forward-looking IT plan.
1. Get your priorities straight.
New technology is exciting, and taking advantage of that excitement and buzz can seem like a clever way to attract students and project a modern sensibility. But as any educator will tell you, some tech simply isn?t useful in the classroom, and some causes more hassles than it removes. That?s why it?s vital to set out your department?s priorities and align them with those of your school. That way, any new technological developments can be considered in light of what?s truly important to faculty and administration alike, whether they?re new apps or hoverboards or something in between.
2. Stay agile.
Sooner or later, there will be another innovation just as world-changing as the internet. Should you wait to see whether it catches on before jumping on board? Of course. Should you wait so long that it?s old news? Definitely not. Create a department – and a school – agile enough to take advantage of every new opportunity when the time is right. It?s as much about mindset as it is about infrastructure.
3. Plan for the expected.
In the meantime, it?s prudent to expect more new and improved versions of the same tech we have today. And since those are the innovations we?ll be dealing with most in the foreseeable future, it just makes sense to arrange your school?s technology set-up in a way that will most easily accommodate new additions over the years.
This is where the N2N Integration Cloud comes into play. Most educational institutions link their various apps, programs, and platforms together via a complex web of individual connections, linking each one to every other one.
The NIC unravels that tangled web and allows schools to integrate any and all systems and applications they use, whether legacy on-premises programs or brand new SaaS apps, through one central hub. Each program has only one connection to deal with ? its connection to that hub. Within the hub, data is instantly translated and transmitted to all other programs for seamless integration. And any time a new app or program needs to be added, it?s as simple as linking it up to that same hub – no more complex additions to the web.
Today?s smart CIO expects the unexpected ? but prepares for the expected, as well. Contact N2N Services today for more information about how we can help you get ready for the future.
