Enterprise application integration for higher education
What is the goal of enterprise application integration (EAI) in higher education?
| • | Improve services to students, faculty and staff |
| • | Streamline processes |
| • | Improve decision-making |
| • | Build stronger, lifelong relationships within and outside the campus community |
Colleges and universities fulfill the role in communities as the ultimate information organizations. Higher education enables the creation and dissemination of data and knowledge to multiple constituencies including students, faculty, administrators, legislators, businesses, parents, and alumni. Access to academic and administrative information across (and between) campuses is critical to strategic success. As a result, higher educational institutions have adopted technology to support vast information needs. A challenge on many campuses today is how to integrate multiple systems to handle various functions.
Benefits
Learn how an integrated infrastructure can profit your institution:
Meet user demands. Today's academics and students expect 24x7 access and personalized, convenient IT services. Faculty, staff, and administrators want information to be available and relevant in order to make decisions or take actions. Each of these constituencies has different needs, yet all should have a cohesive, easy-to-access view into your institution - one that promotes and supports the strong, multifaceted relationships on which today's institutions depend.
Make better-informed decisions. Colleges and universities operate in a highly complex environment with numerous reporting and decision-making requirements, from the President down to the smallest departments. In order to make informed, strategic decisions, administrators need timely, accurate, and easily-accessible data which can be translated into value-added knowledge.
Reduce IT costs. Organizations have often attempted to connect disparate systems and streamline information flows by writing large amounts of code on an ad hoc basis. Designing and implementing an integrated architecture solution reduces financial and time outlays, as well as ongoing maintenance costs.
Reduce administrative costs. The decentralized nature of the campus environment creates increasingly complex and disconnected networks of systems and applications, with data "locked" in numerous information silos, including legacy databases as well as paper-based systems. Improving information flow and access allows staff to increase productivity, eliminate time-intensive manual processes, and focus on the most important aspects of their jobs.
