On today’s episode of the Illumination by Modern Campus podcast, guest host Sharon Schwarzmiller was joined by Allan Chen to discuss the key role IT leaders play, and the importance of understanding processes across campus to grow as an institutional leader. This episode was recorded live at Modern Campus's Educause 2022 booth in Denver.
On today’s episode of the Illumination by Modern Campus podcast, guest host Sharon Schwarzmiller was joined by Allan Chen to discuss the key role IT leaders play, and the importance of understanding processes across campus to grow as an institutional leader. This episode was recorded live at Modern Campus's Educause 2022 booth in Denver.
(00:04) Voiceover: Welcome to Illumination by Modern Campus, the leading podcast focused on transformation and change in the higher education space. We’re continuing our CIO Radio series, where we speak with technology leaders about the trends and challenges reshaping our increasingly digital space. On today’s episode, we speak with Allan Chen, Vice President of IT and CTO at Cal Arts. Speaking live at EDUCAUSE, Allen and podcast guest-host Sharon Schwarzmiller discuss the key role IT leaders play, and the importance of understanding processes across campus to grow as an institutional leader.
(00:41) Sharon Schwarzmiller: All right, everybody. I'd like to welcome Allan Chen. He's the Vice President of IT and CTO of CalArts. We're here today at EDUCAUSE at our Illumination podcast, part of our CIO radio series. So I want to thank you for being with us today, Allan.
(00:58) Allan Chen: Well, thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be here.
(01:01) Sharon Schwarzmiller: How’s the conference going so far?
(01:02) Allan Chen: Oh, it's going wonderfully. It's so great to reconnect with so many people and to see great partners like Modern Campus and The EvoLLLution to just reforge those connections with people.
(01:15) Sharon Schwarzmiller: It is. It's wonderful to be here in person. And to see everyone. Speaking of being in person, if anyone here is, as you're listening to this, hearing some background music—that's because we're live right here at EDUCAUSE. So we may be catching a little bit of background noise, but that's part of where we are. So let's get started. My first question for you is, I was just interested, you know, your background is really interesting, right? So you've been a tech leader in a wide range of institution types, including a law school, a small liberal arts institution, a large state institution, and now a private arts college. What are some of the similarities that hold true for tech leaders across all of those different institution types?
(01:56) Allan Chen: One thing I'll say is I'm very proud of the diversity of professional opportunities I've had. I think it's given me the perspective that really contributes on a team in different ways. I think mechanically there's a lot of similarities. So, student information systems—cybersecurity is a big one that's consistent whether you're at a bigger or small institution. Which can be a challenge at smaller institutions, but it's still the same importance that you're going to see at a larger institution. Thematically, there's also a lot of similarities. So student success, interfacing between IT and administration. That's one of the key roles of a IT leader, CIO, CTO, is to be that connection point between the technology, the users of that technology and administration, and faculty and students in all the different parts of the population. That thematically, like I said, is also consistent whether you're at a large institution or a small one.
(03:04) Sharon Schwarzmiller: You're the hub. You really are. The connective tissue there. So by that same token, what are some of the unique elements involved with leading IT at an arts institution?
(03:16) Allan Chen: Cal Arts is the first art institute I've been at. It's a very different environment. Fundamentally I would say it's that faculty and the staff that support those faculty, and certainly the students that are learning from those faculty are doing really creative, as you can imagine. But also inventive things that are trying to break the rules that are trying to challenge the process. And that's great. And I support it from a philosophical perspective. But from an IT organizational perspective, our job is to kind of make rules. It’s to kind of build boundaries, right? So there is an inherent friction there. It's one that I welcome, it's one that I value, but it's still there to—it's still in opposition a little bit.
(04:08) Sharon Schwarzmiller: Oh, that's fantastic. No, it's a nice challenge. It's an interesting challenge.
(04:11) Allan Chen: Yeah, it's a great challenge to have, and I love trying to find solutions for it. I really do. But it's still a challenge no matter how you look at it, it's a challenge.
(04:20) Sharon Schwarzmiller: All right. So you're here at EDUCAUSE. It makes you think about all this stuff. What are some of the key trends that you're watching, kind of top of mind for you in the ed tech space right now?
(04:34) Allan Chen: There's so many. I just came out of this fabulous general session on the top 10 IT issues EDUCAUSE does every year. It's a publication they do, and they do a presentation at the conference. They do a great job of not only collecting the ideas, but working with the community to help get information about those ideas to help crowdsource the top 10 issues. So there were issues like student experience, not just student success, but student experience. And how do you make that as frictionless as possible? How do you make it as frictionless as it is for consumers to procure items? Not that we're looking at making education like an Amazon or something, but just, you know, how do you meet students where they are. The thing about top 10 issues, there's always a little…it's forward thinking. So it's always a little vague inherently. You know exactly what I mean, I'm not sure what is it going look like in five years, I'm not sure. But I think the idea of a frictionless or a lower friction, lower barrier to entries to student success and student experience is really critically important.
(05:46) Sharon Schwarzmiller: And I'd imagine it might look different at one institution type with certain challenges versus another too, right? So they leave you with that, that kind of green field to figure it out and be imaginative about how you can address those things.
(06:01) Allan Chen: Yes, absolutely. And I think imaginative, imaginative is a great word. Because it's also going back to the different types of institutions I've been at. This is also a challenge as you tackle that problem in different ways. So if you are a large public, minority-serving institution meeting the students where they are means one set of things. Yes. If you're at a small liberal arts college with a very different type of student population, you might have different kinds of resources to achieve that. You're not dealing with 30,000 students, you're trying to impact 2200. It's a different path to impact. But you know, that's one of the trends I'm looking at definitely is how we're going enable student success through a lower barrier to entry.
(06:56) Sharon Schwarzmiller: Did anything else stand out to you in that top 10?
(07:00) Allan Chen: There was an interesting one about ERP companies. This sounds boring but ERP companies. Well, the term used was merge. But, you know, I will say collaborating or sharing knowledge, maybe that means people moving places, I don't know. But the ERP space, which for those who don't know, is the fundamental driving administrative system for how colleges and universities operate. With the student information system being the component of the ERP that is specifically student oriented. So, the idea is there are some legacy companies out there that have been around with a tremendous amount of fabulous knowledge about the student side. And there are companies, newer companies out there with great products on the business side. How do we merge that knowledge together? I don't necessarily think it needs to be an actual, literal merger of companies per se. And I'm not advocating for that. I don't own these companies. I can't make that decision.
(08:05) Sharon Schwarzmiller: It's more about sharing that data.
(08:28) Allan Chen: It’s about sharing that data. How can we as institutions make the most of both of those worlds? So that was an interesting one. I don't have an answer for that one either. It's something that is a very complex one. But that was a really intriguing one when I read that. I immediately tweeted saying, you know, wow, this is a bold idea.
(08:28) Sharon Schwarzmiller: That's very interesting. And it gives you something to kind of go back. And again, you're not going to maybe solve it or even figure out how to address it right away, but it fuels the imagination for how that might work or how it may play out at your institution or at anyone's institution for that matter. So now you've been at different institutions. You've done this for some time. Has the role or the focus of IT leaders like yourself in the higher education space evolved over the last 10 years? I shouldn't even say ‘has it’. I'm sure it has. How has it?
(09:06) Allan Chen: There's this term that EDUCAUSE uses called the Integrative CIO. The idea is that the CIO is one of a few, and I'm not going to claim uniqueness here. But it's one of the few institutional leadership positions that has to understand the entire institution on all of its businesses. So I have to care not just about IT and technology and how it impacts teaching and learning, but I have to, actually, I just said how it impacts teaching and learning. So I need to understand how it works in the classroom. That's the provost area. I have to understand how technology is affecting enrollment management, that's admissions. I also have to understand from an institutional leadership perspective how admissions is going. I mean, the CIO and everyone on senior cabinet needs to appreciate everything else that's happening at the institution. And I think the CIO growth from being just the IT leader to being an institutional leader is the fundamental change. The shift that we're seeing. And there's another great podcast. I'll give a pitch for it. From EDUCAUSE called the Integrative CIO that I highly recommend for people to take a look at.
(10:23) Sharon Schwarzmiller: There's the tentacles now reach into every aspect of the institution. They really do. Well, thank you. This has been extremely interesting. One last question for you, but we do this to end all of our Illumination podcast series episodes, and it's to ask you if someone's going to go to dinner in your hometown, where would you tell them to go?
(10:55) Allan Chen: There is a small…so I live in a town that is actually made up of three separate towns. It's a city that merged three separate towns, so there's three distinct characters to each area. So there's one area that has this older, it’s called Old Town. There are a number of small family owned restaurants, authentic. I'm not sure I could pick just one, but I would point them in that direction to that neighborhood and say, you know, um, see what authentic food type x is like from a family that's been making it for generations. And I think that authenticity is what I value in cuisine, but also as a person.
(11:46) Sharon Schwarzmiller: Excellent. Well, thank you. Appreciate your time today. I hope you enjoy the rest of this conference.
(11:51) Allan Chen: Thank you for having me.
(11:55) Voiceover: This podcast is made possible by a partnership between Modern Campus and The EvoLLLution. The Modern Campus engagement platform, powered solutions for non-traditional student management, web content management, catalog and curriculum management, student engagement and development, conversational text messaging, career pathways, and campus maps and virtual tours. The result innovative institutions can create learner to earner life cycle that engages modern learners for life, while providing modern administrators with the tools needed to streamline workflows and drive high efficiency. To learn more and to find out how to modernize your campus, visit moderncampus.com. That's moderncampus.com.