Podcasts and IT Effectiveness

This fifty-five minute podcast, recorded at the EDUCAUSE 2008 Annual Conference, features a speech by Freeman A. Hrabowski, III, President at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. The speech is entitled, "Why IT Matters: A President's Perspective on Technology and Leadership." Video for this speech is also available.

In May 2003, Nicholas Carr’s Harvard Business Review article postulated that information technology doesn’t matter. As higher education enters a period of great change, such issues as sustainability, diversity and student access, affordability, and accountability will increasingly dominate our institutional strategies. This talk focuses on a presidential view of why IT does matter and how aspiring IT leaders can work with presidents to help their campuses innovate and succeed in addressing these important issues.

This podcast features a 50 minute keynote address from the EDUCAUSE 2008 Enterprise Conference. The speech, "The Big Brother Dilemma," is by Gregory A. Jackson, Vice President & CIO, University of Chicago.

We want cameras watching for problems, but we worry that they will observe or disclose things we'd like to keep private. We want network administrators to track harassing e-mail to its source, but we don't want anyone monitoring our e-mail. We want our buildings to admit occupants and keep strangers out, but we don't want anyone keeping track of when we arrive and leave. In other words, we want big brothers to watch out for us, but we don't want Big Brother to watch us. And IT is caught in the middle.

note: commercial material from television and movies was used in this speech and has been cut out of the recording with as little effect on the speech as possible.

This 30-minute podcast recorded during the EDUCAUSE 2007 Annual Conference features Michael Ferdinando, Account Manager, CIT Academic Technology Services and User Support, Cornell University, Nan McKenna, Director, Client Relations, Stanford University, and Steven Winig, Internal Management Consultant and Special Assistant to the VP, MIT in a session titled "Relationship Management: Stronger Partnerships to Inform IT Planning."

The session abstract:

Relationship management is a holistic approach to understanding customer IT needs that augments existing relationships between customers and IT service teams. The goals are to position central IT to understand customer priorities and to inform operational and strategic planning. This panel discussion will offer three institutions' approaches and the successes and challenges they face.

In this 13 minute podcast, we feature an interview with Dr. Chris Adie, Academic Liaison Director for the College of Science and Engineering in the Information Services Group of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. He provides a key strategic link between the College and Information Services, covering the entire portfolio of IT, Library, eLearning and learning spaces technology. Previous positions have included Head, Specialist Services Division of Edinburgh University Computing Services. A physicist by training, Chris has many years experience of software development in commercial and academic support roles.

This interview was conducted at the EDUCAUSE 2007 Annual Conference in Seattle, Washington. It was conducted by Bill Hogue, Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer for the eight campuses of the University of South Carolina.

In this podcast, we feature an eleven minute interview with Albert DeSimone, Commuications Director for the University of Georgia. As a Communications Officer at the University of Georgia specializing in Information Technology, Mr. DeSimone assists students, faculty, and staff with Web-related projects. He was interviewed at the EDUCAUSE 2007 Southeast Regional Conference regarding his presentation entitled, "Assessing "Portalness: A Guide for CIOs and Other Decision Makers".

The abstract:

Assessing the effectiveness of a portal solution requires more than statistical analysis. In this presentation we will go beyond simple quantitative analysis (number of "hits" or visits) to assess the effectiveness of a portal based on qualitative attributes (integration, personalization, and customization) to assist in the evaluation of a current or future portal implementation.

In this podcast, we present a panel discussion from the EDUCAUSE 2007 Enterprise Conference, entitled "IT Matters!". The panel is moderated by EDUCAUSE Vice President Richard Katz and includes:

David Koehler, Director of Enterprise Systems, Cornell University

James S. Roberts, Executive Vice Provost, Finance and Administration, Duke University

Susan E. Thorin, University Librarian, Dean of Libraries, Syracuse University