ON CAMPUS
campusreview.com.au
Coupled with the embrace of automation,
which can free administrative staff from
the burden of completing repetitive, low
cognition tasks, it’s a development that is
making it possible for institutions do more –
and do it better – with less.
Cloud on
the horizon
SUITS YOU – THE POWER OF A
TAILORED LEARNING EXPERIENCE
a clever idea. For many institutions, it will be
integral to their long-term viability.
BIG BUSINESS
The Australian education
sector is speeding towards
a cloud delivery model.
By Peter Croft
A
fter almost a decade of sluggish
shuffling towards a cloud-based,
digitally driven operating model,
Australian education providers are
collectively twigging to the benefits that
can accrue from giving students and staff
real-time access to information and services.
Chief among these is the ability to keep
pace with the competition in the delivery of
relevant, high quality courseware and a rich
user experience for students, regardless of
whether they choose to study on campus,
remotely or a combination of the two.
This has become a growing challenge,
even for Australia’s sandstone universities,
which have historically found it easy enough
to attract students thanks to the prestige they
enjoy and their stellar reputations for research.
Across the developed world, education
has evolved into a user-pays experience
targeted at an increasingly discerning
clientele. Value for money and a superior
student experience are not just appreciated
but expected and users are voting with their
feet and wallets.
At the same time, funding is being
squeezed, with institutions being asked to
jump through hurdles and find cost savings.
Attracting and retaining students has
become an urgent economic imperative.
Against this backdrop, digital
transformation and across-the-board
uptake of cloud technology is more than
The health of Australia’s education sector
isn’t only a concern for individual providers.
The country’s higher education institutions
make a significant contribution to the
country’s economic prosperity.
Universities employ more than 100,000
staff and service more than one million
enrolled students. This figure includes the
500,000-plus international students who’ve
collectively made international education
Australia’s largest service export.
Education providers also contribute to the
financial health of the communities where
they’re based. In regional areas in particular,
the presence of a sizeable institution can
provide employment opportunities and
boost the local economy.
KEEPING THE CUSTOMER SATISFIED
When they think about learning, today’s
millennial cohort of students don’t think chalk
and talk. They’ve come of age in the apps era
and they want and expect a learner-centred
experience. That includes flexible services,
constant access to learning resources,
including video presentations, and the ability
to submit materials online from anywhere.
In the past, meeting this shopping list of
demands would have called for crippling
capital and operational expenditure – on
large facilities, cumbersome paper-based
learning collateral and hard-drive hogging
programs to enhance collaboration.
Not so with cloud infrastructure.
Embracing a digital as-a-service model
allows institutions to deliver this content and
these resources safely and securely, campus-
wide, on any number of devices, in real time.
One UK university reported shaving
£6.4 million ($11.7 million) a year from its
capital budget as a result of its decision
to decommission its ageing data centre
and migrate its entire suite of applications
to the cloud.
Students don’t just want their courses to be
flexible and accessible. They want institutions
to employ pedagogical models and
methodologies that are consistent with the
way they like to learn. Increasingly, this is via
rich multimedia experiences that incorporate
the use of interactive videoconferencing.
Meanwhile, significant improvements
in telecommunications infrastructure
and technology have made online and
remotely delivered courses the equal of
their classroom-based alternatives, not the
‘poor cousins’ they were perceived to be a
decade or two ago. As a result, institutions
are increasingly being called upon to
offer a blended learning experience for
students, instead of the either/or choice
they faced in the past.
Cloud infrastructure makes possible
the flexible and economical delivery of
applications to students, whether they’re
based on campus or off-site.
The technology also provides a solid
foundation for the rollout of data analytics
tools that can provide institutions with
unprecedented levels of insight into their
‘products’ and ‘clients’.
It’s these insights that can enable them
to transform the student experience by
tailoring courses and coursework to meet
individual educational needs instead of
delivering a one-size-fits-all offering.
TIME TO ACT
The past decade has seen conversations
about the merits of cloud technology
rapidly supplanted by strategies and
action plans for its implementation, across
Australia’s public and private sectors. Some
educational institutions have been slow to
the cloud party but they now have much to
gain from getting with the program.
Conversely, in today’s increasingly
competitive race to attract and retain students
and funding, they have just as much to lose
by not making the technology integral to their
infrastructure and service delivery. ■
Peter Croft is APAC managing director
at Tribal Group.
25