# New Report - The future of higher education: How technology will shape learning

[![Cover of The future of higher education: How technology will shape learning](https://hawksey.info/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/economistfutureofhe.jpg)](http://www.nmc.org/pdf/Future-of-Higher-Ed-(NMC).pdf) The [Economist Intelligence Unit](http://www.eiu.com/), with sponsorship from the [New Media Consortium](http://www.nmc.org/) published [The future of higher education: How technology will shape learning](http://www.nmc.org/pdf/Future-of-Higher-Ed-(NMC).pdf) report yesterday (27th Oct). The key findings, from the global survey of 289 executives\* from higher education and corporate setting, aren't that surprising. In particular the [associated press release](http://www.nmc.org/pdf/NMC-Economist-Study-PR.pdf) highlights that *"online learning is gaining a firm foothold in universities around the world"* and *"university respondents view technology as having a largely positive impact on their campuses"*, which I'm sure most of us already knew.

Digging deeper into the report there are one or two interesting findings not highlighted in the press release. For example almost 50% of respondents said that their institution already use mobile broadband and 66% utilise text messaging/notifications systems. SMS usage was particularly surprising as over half the respondents were from the USA, which has historically had a low take-up of this technology.

When asked how respondents felt higher education would evolve in their country over the next five years, 69% felt that campus libraries would be enhanced by full-text searchable databases. The next most popular with 64% of respondents agreeing was that universities will frequently partner with corporations and other third parties to create new areas of study (this was a closed question with 8 other similar statements).

Overall however I feel the questions used in the survey were a little loaded and with the small sample size I doubt many institutions will be basing their strategic plans on the findings. I'll leave it up to you to decide ...

 *\*189 participants from HE, of which 60% were 'professor'*