Building A Smarter University

Demonstrates how universities can use Big Data to enhance operations and management, improve the education pipeline, and educate the next generation of data scientists. The Big Data movement and the renewed focus on data analytics are transforming everything from healthcare delivery systems to the way cities deliver services to residents. Now is the time to examine how this Big Data could help build smarter universities. While much of the cutting-edge research that is being done with Big Data is happening at colleges and universities, higher education has yet to turn the digital mirror on itself to advance the academic enterprise. Institutions can use the huge amounts of data being generated to improve the student learning experience, enhance research initiatives, support effective community outreach, and develop campus infrastructure. This volume focuses on three primary themes related to creating a smarter university: refining the operations and management of higher education institutions, cultivating the education pipeline, and educating the next generation of data scientists. Through an analysis of these issues, the contributors address how universities can foster innovation and ingenuity in the academy. They also provide scholarly and practical insights in order to frame these topics for an international discussion.

Demonstrates how universities can use Big Data to enhance operations and management, improve the education pipeline, and educate the next generation of data scientists. The Big Data movement and the renewed focus on data analytics are transforming everything from healthcare delivery systems to the way cities deliver services to residents. Now is the time to examine how this Big Data could help build smarter universities. While much of the cutting-edge research that is being done with Big Data is happening at colleges and universities, higher education has yet to turn the digital mirror on itself to advance the academic enterprise. Institutions can use the huge amounts of data being generated to improve the student learning experience, enhance research initiatives, support effective community outreach, and develop campus infrastructure. This volume focuses on three primary themes related to creating a smarter university: refining the operations and management of higher education institutions, cultivating the education pipeline, and educating the next generation of data scientists. Through an analysis of these issues, the contributors address how universities can foster innovation and ingenuity in the academy. They also provide scholarly and practical insights in order to frame these topics for an international discussion.

This book presents peer-reviewed contributions on smart universities by various international research, design and development teams. Smart university is an emerging and rapidly evolving area that creatively integrates innovative concepts; smart software and hardware systems; smart classrooms with state-of-the-art technologies and technical platforms; smart pedagogy based on modern teaching and learning strategies; smart learning and academic analytics; as well as various branches of computer science and computer engineering. The contributions are grouped into several parts: Part 1—Smart Universities: Literature Review and Creative Analysis, Part 2—Smart Universities: Concepts, Systems and Technologies, Part 3—Smart Education: Approaches and Best Practices, and Part 4—Smart Universities: Smart Long Life Learning. The book is a valuable source of research data and findings, design and development outcomes, and best practices for faculty, scholars, Ph.D students, administrators, practitioners and anyone interested in the rapidly growing areas of smart university and smart education.

Co-published with and In this era of “Big Data,” institutions of higher education are challenged to make the most of the information they have to improve student learning outcomes, close equity gaps, keep costs down, and address the economic needs of the communities they serve at the local, regional, and national levels. This book helps readers understand and respond to this “analytics revolution,” examining the evolving dynamics of the institutional research (IR) function, and the many audiences that institutional researchers need to serve.Internally, there is a growing need among senior leaders, administrators, faculty, advisors, and staff for decision analytics that help craft better resource strategies and bring greater efficiencies and return-on-investment for students and families. Externally, state legislators, the federal government, and philanthropies demand more forecasting and more evidence than ever before. These demands require new and creative responses, as they are added to previous demands, rather than replacing them, nor do they come with additional resources to produce the analysis to make data into actionable improvements. Thus the IR function must become that of teacher, ensuring that data and analyses are accurate, timely, accessible, and compelling, whether produced by an IR office or some other source. Despite formidable challenges, IR functions have begun to leverage big data and unlock the power of predictive tools and techniques, contributing to improved student outcomes.

Learning Analytics in Higher Education provides a foundational understanding of how learning analytics is defined, what barriers and opportunities exist, and how it can be used to improve practice, including strategic planning, course development, teaching pedagogy, and student assessment. Well-known contributors provide empirical, theoretical, and practical perspectives on the current use and future potential of learning analytics for student learning and data-driven decision-making, ways to effectively evaluate and research learning analytics, integration of learning analytics into practice, organizational barriers and opportunities for harnessing Big Data to create and support use of these tools, and ethical considerations related to privacy and consent. Designed to give readers a practical and theoretical foundation in learning analytics and how data can support student success in higher education, this book is a valuable resource for scholars and administrators.

Building Smarter Organizations is the antidote for your zombie organization. Building Smarter Organizations is an actionable survival guide for our complex, uncertain, and digital world. Slow-moving and uncoordinated zombie organizations can change. Utilizing the latest in industry research, Vala-Webb has assembled the complete anti-zombie kit to help you rebuild your organization so it can learn quickly, predict accurately, and execute on decisions effectively using: An "open" mindset that fosters innovation and employee engagement Fast-flow communications with visual work management Accelerated, collaborative decision making Don't keep stumbling and lurching around. Lead the change and equip your organization to thrive.

Local, state, and national economies are facing unprecedented levels of international competition. The current fiscal crisis has hampered the ability of many governments in the developed world to directly facilitate economic growth. At the same time, many governments in the developing world are investing significant new resources into local infrastructure and industry development initiatives. At the heart of the current economic transformation lie our colleges and universities. Through their roles in education, innovation, knowledge transfer, and community engagement, these institutions are working toward spurring economic growth and prosperity. This book brings together leading scholars from a variety of disciplines to assess how universities and colleges exert impact on economic growth. The contributors consider various methodologies, metrics, and data sources that may be used to gauge the performance of diverse higher education institutions in improving economic outcomes in the United States and around the world. Also presented are new typologies of economic development activities and related state policies that are designed to improve understanding of such initiatives and generate new energy and focus for an international community of scholars and practitioners working to formulate new models for how public universities and colleges may lead economic development in their states and communities while still performing their traditional educational functions. Universities and Colleges as Economic Drivers is meant to cultivate greater understanding among elected officials, business representatives, policymakers, and other concerned parties about the central roles universities and colleges play in national, state, and local economies.

MQ Telemetry Transport (MQTT) is a messaging protocol that is lightweight enough to be supported by the smallest devices, yet robust enough to ensure that important messages get to their destinations every time. With MQTT devices such as smart energy meters, cars, trains, satellite receivers, and personal health care devices can communicate with each other and with other systems or applications. This IBM® Redbooks® publication introduces MQTT and takes a scenario-based approach to demonstrate its capabilities. It provides a quick guide to getting started and then shows how to grow to an enterprise scale MQTT server using IBM WebSphere® MQ Telemetry. Scenarios demonstrate how to integrate MQTT with other IBM products, including WebSphere Message Broker. This book also provides typical usage patterns and guidance on scaling a solution. The intended audience for this book ranges from new users of MQTT and telemetry to those readers who are looking for in-depth knowledge and advanced topics.