Prerequisites

The revolutionary opportunities inherent in digital information technology cannot be realized until all members of the university community have adequate access to computational resources and support for their effective use. The essential prerequisites include:

• for faculty and staff, ``desktop'' computing capacity, appropriate to (differing) disciplinary baselines;
• for students, adequate computer laboratories and classrooms, given the expectation that many students will have their own computers;
• LAN connections to the high speed network, and hence to the Internet, for all offices, laboratories, libraries, computer classrooms, dormitories, and for students, faculty, and staff in off-campus locations;
• regular budgets for hardware and software maintenance, upgrades, and replacement;
• support staff for training, for innovative educational computing, and for use and maintenance of software and hardware;
• incentives for faculty to incorporate digital technology into their teaching;
• comprehensive and ongoing attention to network security.