Digital transformation is changing how we relate, have fun, work and seek knowledge. And we, organizations focused on teaching, research and innovation, are also part of this process and need to reinvent ourselves.

To follow this evolution, Educause, a North-American NGO whose mission is to promote the evolution of higher education through the use of information technologies, carries out, since 2000 (check the timeline of the evolution of challenges ) a research to identify the ten main challenges of IT of teaching institutions, highlighting what is important and where to focus.

The 10 main challenges of IT for 2020: simplify, sustain, innovate

1 – Strategy of information security: develop a security strategy based on a risk that effectively detects, responds, and avoids threats and challenges to security.

2 – Privacy: ensure the privacy rights of institutional components, by keeping responsibility for the protection of all kinds of restricted data.

3 – Sustainable funding: develop funding models that are able to maintain quality and accommodate new needs and increased use of IT services in an era of severe budgetary restrictions.

4 – Digital integrations: ensure system interoperability, scalability, and extensibility, as well as integrity, security, standards and governance of data, in many apps and platforms.

5 – Retention of students and conclusion of courses: develop resources and systems to include artificial intelligence in students’ services to provide personalized and opportune support.

6 – Higher Education focused on the student: create an ecosystem of services to support the student’s entire cycle of life, from prospection to enrollment, learning, job placement, involvement of former students, and continued education.

7 – Enrollment improvement: use technology, data and analyses to develop a strategy of inclusive enrollment and financially sustainable to provide services to more and new students, by personalizing experiences of selection, registration, and learning.

8 – Higher Education Viability: align priorities and resources of IT organizations with institutional resources to reach a sustainable future

9 – Administrative simplification: promote process improvement and system reengineering to decrease redundant or unnecessary efforts and improve the final user’s experiences.

10 – Integrative IT Leader: reposition or reinforce the IT leader’s role as an essential strategic partner of institutional leadership to support institutional missions.

The ten raised questions will be deepened and solved in the edition of January 2020 of Educause magazine.

Brazilian look

In this launching edition of the newsletter Perspectiva, we brought the challenges for the reality of teaching and research institutions in Brazil. We have interviewed the IT manager of Unirio, Paulo Santos, who provided us a panorama on the main barriers and trends of innovation in Brazilian universities.

Watch the interview!

And in your institution?

Which of these challenges mapped by Educause are related to those that will be faced by your institution in 2020? And what can you do to overcome them?

Tell us!

Talking about trends...

Gartner consulting company has listed the ten main strategic trends of technology for 2020.

Check out them here!