Kathy Gates is the CIO at the University of Mississippi. Writing in EDUCAUSE Review, she details the route by which the university reached the launch of its Official Ole Miss App, and outlines the considerations and planning along the way. The case study is technically quite specific, but the broader considerations and lessons learned are quite useful. The article begins with:

Key Takeaways

• Mobility is just the latest transformative technology to grab the attention of higher education IT, challenging us to map out strategies to use it effectively.
• Teaming up with a leading mobile news app developer helped Ole Miss produce a killer university news app targeting the entire campus community.
• Moving quickly to provide this mobile news app gave the university more time to develop a comprehensive mobile strategy for future efforts.

Those of us with deep roots in higher education and information technology (IT) are familiar with and sometimes even thrive on the adventures that new, transformative technologies bring. We are keenly aware that our survival and effectiveness depend on anticipating future technology trends, preparing for them, and then solidly delivering on commitments. As technology leaders, we must establish infrastructures and develop partnerships in the present that will allow us to adapt to future needs before we even know what they are. And, as with any good research problem, we may need to actively experiment and sometimes even retreat and regroup to land on the "right" solution. Mobility is just the latest transformative technology to grab our attention, challenging us to map out strategies for its most effective use in higher education. This article tells the story of how the University of Mississippi (UM) deployed a news app for the iPad as part of its overall mobility strategy.