III. The Campus Environment is Difficult to Manage

The campus environment is a pervasive computing environment that exposes computers used by students, faculty and staff to problems at an ever-increasing rate. Most learning institutions maintain a limited IT staff, while most computer users are inexperienced, unaware of the problems that they can cause when customizing the laptops and are unable to troubleshoot IT problems. This combination makes managing and troubleshooting support incidents a daunting task.

As the learning institution develops mobile computing programs, a tremendous burden is placed on the IT staff to support the mobile computers and the application set necessary to support the lesson plans.

In the campus environment, IT generally implements one of the following management strategies:

• High Degree of Control IT enforces a high degree of control by locking down and preventing customization of mobile systems. By restricting usage, IT can protect the software image essential for class work and reduces support incidents.
• Low Degree of Control The mobile computer user has the ultimate accountability and usability is not restricted. However, the risk of software corruption and loss of coursework (data) is high. Students and faculty use their laptops at their own risk.