The modern university in the digital age

The Brief:- Investigate the current thinking, research, practice and theoretical frameworks around the question, ‘What does a modern university look like in the digital age?’ --- The Method:- An extensive review of the recent literature was conducted using search terms such as ‘digital age', 'connected’, ‘web 2.0’, ‘challenges’, ‘elearning’, ‘higher education’, ‘university’, ‘social media’ and ‘pedagogy’, along with a variety of platform-specific and current theoretical and practice related terms. This literature review was reinforced with a call for contributions from staff engaged with the University eCentre as well as input from a variety of practitioners in e-learning, educational development and employability from around the UK and Europe. We posed the question ‘What does a modern university look like in a digital age?’ and received over thirty responses suggesting reports, literature and research data, as well as some personal opinions and positions. These were integrated into a briefing paper. From this we identified six key headlines, as well as suggesting a conclusion.