Meeting the Challenge: - The Council of Independent Colleges

Welch Suggs
opportunity to try out the latest innovation in desktop
computer technology: the Apple IIe.
For a dozen years in the late 1980s and 1990s, CIC
conducted annual workshops for the campus administrators
responsible for making decisions about the purchase and use
of information technology. For a number of years, through
a collaborative relationship with Compaq and Microsoft
Corporation, CIC offered computer labs at the Presidents
and Chief Academic Officers Institutes to introduce campus
leaders to emerging technologies. In 2004, with support
from the Verizon Foundation, CIC commissioned and
published a volume on Information Technology Benchmarks:
A Practical Guide for College and University Presidents, to
provide quantitative benchmarks and answer questions
that presidents frequently raised about the return on the
considerable investments in technology that their institutions
had made in the past decade.
Beginning in 2002, CIC has sponsored workshops
on the Transformation of the College Library, exploring
such topics as: advancing information literacy as an element
of liberal education, the role of the library in teaching and
learning through collaboration between librarians and faculty
members, the changing use and conceptualization of physical
space in the library, the challenges of using technology to
improve student learning, and setting institutional priorities
for library-related costs when they exceed traditional budget
guidelines. Teams consisting of three persons from nearly
200 CIC member institutions will eventually participate
in the library workshops. CIC has received grants for these
workshops from the William and Flora Hewlett, Gladys
Krieble Delmas, Carl and Lily Pforzheimer, and Andrew W.
Mellon Foundations.
To help colleges and universities plan academic
facilities that use technology effectively, CIC has also
collaborated with the National Institute for Technology
and Liberal Education and Project Kaleidoscope to develop
a Learning Spaces and Technology Workshop. Financial
support is provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
1998
The Atlantic Philanthropies award CIC
$2.5 million in grants for the Engaging
Communities and Campuses program,
which culminated in 2005 with a webbased
best-practices publication.
1999
The Dean’s Institute is
renamed the Institute for
Chief Academic Officers.
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