In this article, the author talks about the challenges faced by two schools that lie, coincidentally, just 110 miles apart in the vast spaces of North Dakota. Both schools, members of the North Dakota University System, decided to forge ahead with a unified communications (UC) implementation. And while their final solutions differ, how the two…

In spite of the fact that web 2.0-enabled tools and services are supposed to be easy to set up and simple to use, some faculty in higher education never got that memo. They don't know a tweet from a tag, identify Ning as a four-letter word for "river in China", and would probably guess that Squidoo is a friend of SpongeBob and Patrick. This guide…

This is the third installment in a four-part series that follows the exploits of Gene, a well-established CIO of a sizable IT organization at a top-100 university. Gene has been working with his team to regain the trust of the campus through Project Rescue, a 30-day turnaround plan focused on demonstrating IT's value. Project Rescue has two…

Divorcing one student information system and hooking up with another can cause serious upheaval. With the right plan in place, the transition to a new student information system can go surprisingly smoothly. The author interviewed technologists at Southwest Wisconsin Technical College and the Emily Griffith Opportunity School (CO) who recently…

Despite resistance from faculty, staff, and students, and the sheer magnitude of the effort from a technological and management point of view, some campuses are shifting electronic portfolios away from department-specific initiatives to become institution-wide programs. The move seems to be driven by institutions wanting to focus more deeply and…