Here are a couple things I learned while in Cincinnati, OH earlier this week attending the HighEdWeb Association’s 2010 National Conference:
There are many, many objects more comfortable to sit on than the chairs in the Cincinnati Hilton Netherland Plaza conference rooms. A few that come to mind include a wood plank, a rock, or an upside-down 5-gallon bucket.
A high energy presenter like Robin Smail (@Robin2Go) is the best way to start a conference. She didn’t even let the fact that she was presenting a topic (Google Wave) that would be obsolete in two months phase her. After listening to the group’s thoughts on the extent to which Google should be trusted I learned that I am not the only paranoid higher ed techie out there. And seriously…an official title of “Disruptive Technologist” is just cool.
Video production and live event streaming seems to be an elusive topic for many campuses. The mix of technical skills, Audio/Video software & hardware skills, and access to equipment make it challenging for any one department to oversee.
Higher Ed Web Professionals are really social people…except in the elevator. Seriously, twitter backchannel was abuzz, but step in the elevator and no one talked to one another in person. Social events in the evenings are a different story…I can honestly say that I learned as much in the bars, restaurants, excursions than I did during the sessions.
Mobile apps are here to stay despite web browsers on devices making a native app’s less necessary. People must really like having an icon to click!
Mark Greenfield (@markgr) has great taste in pre-session music and a unique outlook for the future of web and education. I came away with an amazon shopping cart full of must-read books after listening to him for a couple hours.
Despite hating keynote sessions himself, Steve Krug (@skrug) gives an an exciting and entertaining keynote on usability! Watching a live mini-usability test makes me want to do these more regularly, and for more pages than our institutional homepage.
Dylan Wilbanks (@dylanw) gives an eloquent presentation on lessons learned after 10 years in our field. I think all new higher ed web professionals should see this presentation as part of their new-hire orientation! If nothing else, it gave me hope that the challenges I’ve seen in the same time aren’t unique and can have a happy ending.
Campus facebook pages come with ups and downs (especially during big snow storms!). If you build it, and if students come to it, then you have to be prepared to manage a really powerful communication tool.
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This was my first experience with the Higher Ed Web Conference and I’m impressed, and hooked! Can’t wait for next year’s event in Austin, Texas.
#1 by Brittany - October 16th, 2010 at 19:41
Sounds like you had a really great conference, with lots of interesting topics! Maybe I’ll think about going along next year…