Ed Tech Blog
Colleges and Universities that have a global presence and a network of multiple campuses worldwide have a unique set of challenges. These challenges are not unlike a business operating offices in several different locations. The concerns can range from “out of sight, out of mind” and reduced productivity to a cohesive team and consistent cultural/ team identity.
Drilling down deeper, the obstacles may become magnified for individual departments within the university, for example academic technology and AV. We’ve talked a lot about campus wide standards for classroom technology. Creating technology standards is a useful and helpful process on many levels. Standards reduce systems cost of maintenance and down-time, manages expectations of students and faculty, reduces training time and can even help save money on equipment. Here’s one challenge: How do you maintain those standards on different campuses, let alone different parts of the world?
For an upcoming article for SouthEast Education Network, I talked to the managers of technology departments within a couple of high profile universities that have a worldwide presence. They discuss how they navigate the obstacles of managing technology systems on remote campuses for long-term and connected consistency. Until that is released this fall, here are some ideas on how to deal with managing multiple campuses. This probably-not-all-inclusive list isn’t AV specific, but should provide insight on managing teams in other locations.
Qualified people know how to do their job. Hire qualified people. Then focus on frequent communication and support to maintain relationships, not on constant oversight and micro-managing projects. This is especially important during onboarding.
Create processes and best-practices that are consistent across all campuses. Whether this is a process for interviewing and evaluating outsourced labor, or a system to notify helpdesk of a problem try to keep processes as consistent as possible across campus...
Read more: 5 Tips For Managing Technology Teams on Multiple Campuses
This originally appeared in the Spring issue of SouthEast Education Network (SEEN) Magazine.
Ask management level professionals what is the most difficult part of their job and many will respond, “finding good help.” Arguably, the biggest complaint GenExers have about “workforce rookie” Millennials seems to be their lack of preparedness when entering the “real world” after school. There has been a lot of discussion about using collaborative learning in both K-12 and higher education classrooms to help close the skills-gap. At the forefront of these discussions has been the variety of instructional technologies designed to enhance collaborative classrooms and the modification of lecture-centered pedagogy. There are many technologies and resources available to teachers that support an active learning curriculum. While technology in itself is not collaborative, i.e. collaboration systems are only collaborative if students and instructors utilize them to that end, it can help facilitate and provide a conduit for collaborative, active and group learning.
Collaborative or active learning is a methodology that transforms that traditional lecture or teacher focused classroom into a student or learning centered room. Students work together to help each other understand content, solve problems or create projects and products with the instructor working as a...
Healthcare is booming. Mostly because of the boomers. As the largest generational population in US history ages, the impact on all facets of healthcare and medicine is undeniable. History.com points out the by 2030 ONE IN FIVE Americans will be over the age of 65. Today boomers make up more than a quarter of the total US population. The baby boomer generation was the most educated generation in the US up until that point. They got married later, 50% of them got divorced, they made good money and they pushed the boundaries of traditional American households. Outside the house, they made strides in business, politics and medicine. According to Wikipedia (you can’t believe everything you read on the interweb) “baby boomers control over 80% of personal financial assets and more than half of all consumer spending. They buy 77% of all prescription drugs, 61% of over-the-counter drugs, and 80% of all leisure travel.”
You probably understand where this is heading. Boomers are aging…lots of them. They make up almost 30% of the US population. In addition to that, medical technology continues to evolve and directly impacts the average life-expectancy. Diseases and afflictions that would have killed someone 50 years ago...
To our attendees: Thank you for helping to make our first Higher Education Technology Summit a success. We realize this time of year is exceptionally busy and appreciate your taking the time to attend! We hope that you were able to take away some valuable information from the sponsor sessions and the technology manager panel discussion.
We’d like to offer our sincere appreciation to the panelists, Elaine Mello, Tim O’Neil and Mike Lucas, and the moderator, Margot Douaihy, for the excellent information during the technology manager panel discussion.
To future attendees: We are in the process of planning additional HETS in different regions throughout the US. If you are interested in hosting or attending a HETS event, please let me know!
If you want to know more, here’s some great coverage of our event from our friends at HigherEd Tech Decisions. If you’d like to request a copy of the program of events, please contact me in the comments below!
We’ve heard it before- and it won’t be going away any time soon- one of the biggest challenges in AV right now is finding enough trained help to fill the need. One of the reasons for this is that most high school or college age students don’t think about AV when they consider continuing their education and/ or training in the technology industry. AV has expanded beyond push carts and overhead projectors- to the point where most of today’s student won’t even know what that means. Modern classroom AV is installed technology. It is seamless in the room and is becoming an integral part of daily learning and lessons. So students don’t even have to think about it.
Has AV become invisible?
If it works properly, AV can amaze. But the reason it amazes is not because of the “audiovisual technology.” It’s because it simplifies, stuns, complicates, clarifies, assists, coordinates….it just does. AV has become an integral ingredient in a recipe for learning, experiences, and communication. If left out (like yeast) one will have a “flat” or unremarkable experience. Often, if asked to pick out what made an experience amazing or flat (or anywhere in between), the respondent will answer...
The first Tuesday of every month, the Huntington Chamber Of Commerce Education Committee meets to discuss relevant topics and challenges faced by today’s modern workforce. Then we decide which topics are most important to our local professionals and create hour long seminars. It is a great resource for the business community because these seminars are free, we provide breakfast, and the content is presented by experts in their particular field. The committee is made up professionals from a number of industries including financial planning/ wealth management, graphic design, business consulting, insurance, higher education administrators, architects, you get the picture. We are a diverse group.
Today’s meeting was interesting because we had a guest speaker who happened to be the Assistant Superintendent of Instruction and Curriculum for my school district, a K-12 public system with about 6,000 students. He was talking about the nearly $2.9 million in technology grants the school district has received in the past four years. This has allowed them to continue to expand their wireless bandwidth and initiate and grow their STE(A)M programs. Kindergartners are learning drag and drop code, 3rd graders are using a 3D printer and 3D immersion for their robotics and other classes, 4th...