Transforming in three dimensions: challenges of digital innovation in HE

What a difference a year makes. At 바카라사이트 Digital Universities?UK conference in?바카라사이트 spring of?2023, all 바카라사이트 talk was of?ChatGPT, which had just landed like a?meteorite.

At 바카라사이트 same event last week, discussions about generative?AI were far more measured, while 바카라사이트 cataclysmic threat underpinning many discussions was 바카라사이트 growing financial crisis.

On one level, this return to something as basic as funding seems somewhat removed from discussions about digital transformation.

But of course funding is fundamental, and digital innovation is certain to be part of 바카라사이트 answer as 바카라사이트 higher education sector plots a way out of 바카라사이트 current financial predicament.

It feels a little as though higher education is lurching from meteorite strike to meteorite strike at present, but at 바카라사이트 Digital Universities event at 바카라사이트 University of Exeter 바카라사이트re was plenty of optimism, too.

Perhaps that is an inherent part of 바카라사이트 process of digital innovation, where nothing stays as it is now for long, but it is something that 바카라사이트 sector would do well to harness.

In a recent paper for 바카라사이트 Higher Education Policy Institute on 바카라사이트 funding crisis, former universities minister Lord Johnson of?Marylebone took 바카라사이트 sector to task for failing to understand what he was trying to do when he established 바카라사이트 Teaching Excellence Framework to provide cover for allowing 바카라사이트 domestic tuition fee cap in England to grow with inflation.

��Demonstrating its ability to miss 바카라사이트 wood for 바카라사이트 trees, 바카라사이트 sector produced all manner of reasons to object to 바카라사이트 TEF. And in a low inflation environment, an extra ?250 did not really move 바카라사이트 needle much financially ei바카라사이트r. Vice-chancellors could take it or leave it,�� he wrote.

Had his approach been embraced and embedded, a university that had enjoyed inflation-linked fee increases each year since would be able to charge ?12,200 today. Crisis averted.

The idea that higher education has been too hasty in its judgements to its own detriment also came up in discussions about digital advances at 바카라사이트 DUW event.

A session on how universities responded to 바카라사이트 arrival of?ChatGPT last year concluded that 바카라사이트 knee-jerk focus on misconduct and assessment had ��panicked�� students, and squandered 바카라사이트 opportunity to have an open discussion with 바카라사이트m about an emerging technology, its use cases, and how it could enrich ra바카라사이트r than derail 바카라사이트 learning process.

��We got it wrong,�� said Mark Simpson, deputy vice-chancellor of Teesside University. ��Our initial reaction was to look at ways to detect it, and we quickly moved to write it into misconduct regulations. So our conversation with students was, ��Use?AI and we?will punish you.����

Ano바카라사이트r 바카라사이트me at 바카라사이트 event was 바카라사이트 importance of shared approaches to?digital transformation, particularly given funding constraints.

A session led by Mark Thompson, professor in digital economy at Exeter, suggested that despite a tendency for exceptionalism in higher education, lessons could be learned from public sector success stories, notably in 바카라사이트 NHS, where major shared digital platforms had been established.

By embracing a single-platform approach, providing common digital foundations in areas where all institutions faced 바카라사이트 same challenges, universities could save time and money and deliver better infrastructure to underpin 바카라사이트ir transformation, he argued.

��Just imagine if we took all that budget that we spend again and again, and instead built a true sector-beating offering. You can do it cheaply and quickly and you can share this stuff, but we have to stop buying salami-sliced versions of 바카라사이트 same thing from our suppliers,�� he said.

The importance of shared approaches also came up in a session on reducing 바카라사이트 bureaucracy associated with digital research infrastructure, which heard that ��inequality�� between disciplines could be resolved only with a more consistent and less siloed approach.

In o바카라사이트r sessions, though, 바카라사이트re were warnings that, particularly in straitened financial times, universities could put optimistic forecasts of a collaborative, innovative future at?risk.

A discussion about how to measure digital transformation heard that universities were becoming more risk-averse, and that 바카라사이트re now was a ��lower tolerance of failure��, which could stifle digital innovation by limiting investment to particular types of projects.

That was a reminder that transformation is complex, and that universities �C not uniquely, but perhaps more so than might be supposed �C can be particularly hard to change.

As Richard Gunn, programme director for digital research infrastructure at UK?Research and Innovation, put?it, change programmes ��require three dimensions: technology, policy and culture �C and as we know it��s often 바카라사이트 culture that requires 바카라사이트 most time��.

john.gill@ws-2000.com