Gartner Research

Top Technology
Trends in Higher
Education for 2023

Paul Riley, Tony Sheehan, Terri-Lynn Thayer,

Robert Yanckello, Marlena Brown, Grace Farrell,
Saher Mahmood, Robert Anderson, Craig Lawson

21 February 2023
Top Technology Trends in Higher Education for
2023
Published 21 February 2023 - ID G00780827 - 22 min read
By Analyst(s): Paul Riley, Tony Sheehan, Terri-Lynn Thayer, Robert Yanckello, Marlena
Brown, Grace Farrell, Saher Mahmood, Robert Anderson, Craig Lawson
Initiatives: Education Technology Optimization and Modernization

New and leading technologies, such as hyperautomation and

LXPs, are among six technology trends influencing processes and
instruction in higher education in 2023. Higher education CIOs
should use this research to evaluate how these trends and our
recommendations will shape their IT strategy.

Overview
Opportunities
■ The 2023 CIO and Technology Executive Survey shows that the top higher education
enterprise priority is customer/user experience. The challenge is to modernize service
provision at the same time as dealing with significant legacy issues.

■ CIOs intend to increase funding in 2023 for cybersecurity, cloud platforms and data
analytics. In the absence of clear strategies and long-term investment, many
universities do not have a suitable platform in place that is robust enough to handle
a modern infrastructure.

■ Universities are operating in a complex, competitive environment. University leaders

look to CIOs to deliver transformation initiatives that can deal with sector-specific
issues, such as student recruitment, retention and attainment.

Recommendations
Higher education CIOs responsible for technology optimization and modernization should:

■ Map the maturity of the technology trends against the institution’s own strategy, and
use combinations of these trends to guide digital investments to deliver university
objectives.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 1 of 20

■ Garner senior leadership support by connecting the university strategy, risk
mitigation and consequences of inaction around these trends to:

■ Deliver value to the evolving student experience.

■ Support new workforce trends.

■ Enable efficient delivery of operations.

■ Build a composable technology foundation.

What You Need to Know

This research focuses on the technology trends affecting higher education globally. A
partner piece focuses on business trends in higher education (see Top Business Trends
Impacting Higher Education for 2023).

The business challenges set the context for higher education CIOs to use the technology
trends to design:

■ Flexible strategies

■ Hybrid operating models

■ Agile governance

The aim is to develop a clear connection between both the technology investments and
university objectives. Developing this connection will help enable CIOs to demonstrate
that IT is not just operational and transactional, but that IT can be a key strategic partner
in delivering the university priorities in an uncertain environment.

As universities adapt new ways of working, several trends are proving durable, with 50%
of the 2022 trends repeated and updated for 2023, as CIOs consistently focus on
improving operational excellence and ensuring business continuity and resilience.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 2 of 20

Universities that broadly adopt permanent hybrid models to enable both a learning and
working environment require significant advances in supporting technology. At the same
time, staff and student expectations for easy-to-use, personalized access to content and
collaboration grow rapidly, driving universities to use existing and new technologies to
innovate learning, teaching and research strategies. The combination of challenges has
made it difficult to scale innovation past small-scale pilots. It is imperative that CIOs use
these trends to have collaborative discussions with senior leaders that involve making
universitywide improvements and not ones confined within IT or at a local level. These
discussions should embrace the strategic application of the trends and not isolated,
tactical use cases.

The technology trends can be grouped into three categories (see Figure 1):

■ Personalized learning: Growing student expectations will drive investment to

enhance the total student experience through improved applications to personalized
content. Greater use of data and analytics will enable institutions to better support
student retention and attainment of student success.

■ Operational improvement: The ability to enhance the efficiency of tasks and

processes, while freeing capacity for value-added activities and innovation, will
influence the degree to which higher education leaders maximize the impact of
technology investments.

■ Technical capabilities: Embedding technology trends, such as threat intelligence and

classroom evolution, will be critical for higher education institutions to deliver on
student and staff expectations, operational needs and university priorities.

Figure 1: Top Technology Trends Impacting Higher Education in 2023

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 3 of 20

Table 1: Trend Profiles

Personalized Learning Operational Improvement Technical Capabilities

Learning Experience Hyperautomation Cybersecurity — Threat

Platforms Intelligence

Student Success Analytics Composable ERP/SIS Classroom Evolution

Source: Gartner (February 2023)

Personalized Learning
Learning Experience Platforms

Analysis by Marlena Brown, Saher Mahmood

Description:

A learning experience platform (LXP), also known as a peer learning experience

platform, integrates both internal and external sources of learning content. It uses
artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to track and analyze learning data
to provide users with an intuitive, easily navigable, tailored experience. Solutions are
primarily delivered by using software as a service (SaaS). LXPs are used to enhance an
individual learner’s interactions and engagement via:

■ Greater personalization

■ Content curation

■ AI-based recommendations and training

■ Gamified user experience

■ Expanded breadth of content

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 4 of 20

They typically allow learners to access, curate and share a wider variety of formal and
informal content beyond what is found in the learning management system (LMS). LXPs
function as aggregators, hosting content from multiple internal and external providers,
allowing learners to access a wide array of content. Content types in an LXP can include
blog posts, articles, videos, podcasts and e-learning course content. Leveraging AI, users
receive personalized content recommendations (such as including third-party blog posts,
articles, documents and videos available on the internet) and are able to access learning
content that can build a comprehensive variety of skills.

The aggregation of courses allows learners to access different modalities, such as

synchronous, asynchronous, self-study, live-instructor-led or a virtual-instructor-led.

Why Trending:

Declining Enrollment

Universities continue to see declining enrollment. 1 Fewer numbers of traditional college

age students 2 and questions around the value of education 3 are contributing to
enrollment decline. These factors are influencing universities’ offerings to differentiate
themselves and attract not just traditional learners, but also nontraditional learners.
Offering LXPs can potentially help universities attract nontraditional learners by improving
the learner experience, increasing personalized engagement and developing skills aligned
with workforce needs.

Increased Skills-Based Hiring

Many externalities and pressures, coupled with the disruptive impact of the pandemic,
have increased the demand for new technology and soft skills. Employers are resetting
degree requirements in a wide variety of roles. This means that roles that once required a
four-year degree now require some postsecondary education or training, but less than a
four-year degree. 4 Often, educational institutions do not have the agility for a timely
response to meet these new demands, creating a vacuum in the requisite workforce
pipeline. LXPs can allow institutions to offer additional skills in a short turnaround,
allowing learners to supplement their formal education while remaining within the
institution’s ecosystem.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 5 of 20

As a result of the declining enrollment and skill demand pressures, Gartner has seen the
number of education-related client interactions around LXPs double from 2021. This
increased interest in LXPs indicates that universities are exploring ways to gather more-
detailed student profiles and learning activity information. Having this information not
only equips universities with more-robust analytics and insights from data that spans the
academic spectrum, but also allows the use of AI to efficiently and effectively align
learning resources and experiences with each student.

Implications:

■ To build robust student profile data, universities are seeking to enhance their ability
to track and measure holistic learning experience data that includes:

■ Certifications

■ Badges

■ Skills

■ Competencies

■ Proficiency levels

■ Work-related expertise

■ Maturity in this area does not come from traditional higher education. LXPs were
born out of corporate learning platforms that address perceived shortcomings
associated with traditional higher education LMSs.

■ LXPs use AI to collect and analyze data on learners’ interactions and make learning
content recommendations based on that data.

■ While the LMS and LXP can both be required, they are not mutually exclusive (that is,
you can’t choose one over the other). Institutions still retain the need for a form of
administrative-based control on learning content, which is only possible through an
LMS. However, institutions also can allow learners to access more-expansive
information through LXP.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 6 of 20

Actions:

■ Assess the organization’s current capabilities across the full spectrum of existing
LMS technologies by engaging with partners from academic leadership to
development of a vision. Strategize and plan how to leverage LXPs.

■ Develop institution wide AI policies to ensure the appropriate use of data. These
should include human-centric concepts that are secure and accountable.

■ Partner with corporate entities to leverage opportunities to expand skills and

capability offerings so that learner skills align with employer needs and can be
easily curated using LXP technologies.

Further Reading:

L&D Technology Innovations Bullseye 2023 Report

AI Ethics: Use 5 Common Principles as Your Starting Point

Hype Cycle for Higher Education, 2022

Student Success Analytics

Analysis by Marlena Brown, Tony Sheehan

Description:

Student success analytics involve the integration of data-informed practices that consider
students and their diverse contexts to influence decisions that affect student experiences
and outcomes. 5 Technology solutions can range from business intelligence platforms to
technology combinations that are designed to capture and present data from across a
multitude of transitional systems (for example, student information system [SIS], LMS,
CRM and ERP) to inform strategies aimed at student success. Typical technology
components will improve the institutional ability to:

■ Extract data from source systems

■ Transform the data (apply institutional business rules)

■ Load data into readable formats (such as data models, data marts and data
warehouses)
Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 7 of 20
■ Allow for visualization, typically through reports and/or dashboards

Institutional stakeholders consider these visualizations as essential components to

inform and measure efforts related to student success initiatives.

Why Trending:

Postsecondary institutions have lost over a million students since 2020. 1 This loss in
enrollment has increased pressure on CIOs to provide information that empowers
executives to:

1. Identify new revenue streams through targeted recruitment of traditional and

nontraditional learners who will be successful completers.

2. Personalize experiences for current students to promote retention and quickly react
to individual student academic and nonacademic needs.

3. Quantify the value of a degree by demonstrating how successful degree completion

contributes to workforce needs and improved attainment.

Analytics underlie the ability to successfully deliver information in each of the areas
above to develop and measure the effectiveness of these efforts to support student
success. The priority institutions are placing on this is reflected in the 2023 Gartner CIO
and Technology Executive Agenda Survey. Results found that 43% of higher education
respondents plan to increase their investment in business intelligence/data analytics
technologies in 2023 (see 2023 CIO and Technology Executive Agenda: 4 Actions to
Deliver ‘Digital Dividends’).

Implications:

■ Market offerings will vary and range from industry-neutral platform solutions to
specific, functional, focused point-solution-based analytic offerings.

■ Departmental and siloed processes may result in redundant and overlapping

technologies on campus, requiring governance to ensure the data and analytics
asset portfolio is rationalized.

■ The desire to find an appropriate technology solution will overshadow opportunities

leveraging existing solutions when use cases aligned with institutional outcomes are
not identified.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 8 of 20

■ Individual departmental analytic initiatives will cause redundant and/or competing
priorities that lead to technology resource bottlenecks and duplicated student
intervention efforts, requiring leadership to initiate a coordinated student success
analytics effort.

Actions:

■ Create a data and analytics vision, strategy and plan, in partnership with
stakeholders, that intentionally connect new and existing outcomes to the value
propositions and operating approaches required to achieve student success and set
the foundation for a data-driven culture.

■ Align data and analytics with institutional outcomes through use cases to provide
practical examples that institutional stakeholders can relate to and better
understand in terms of real student outcome results.

■ Design an institutional approach to data and analytics governance programs for

decisions such as investment in enterprise-level products versus niche education-
specific products. Identification and prioritization of use cases and data usage
standards will be needed.

■ Integrate and manage data that provides agility, resilience and clarity across the
institutional data landscape to create increased student success impact.

Further Reading:

Data and Analytics Essentials: Architect an Analytics Platform

Put Data and Analytics to Work in Higher Education to Impact Student Success

4 Focus Areas to Improve Your D&A Maturity

Operational Improvement
Hyperautomation

Analysis by Terri-Lynn Thayer

Page 9 of 20
Gartner, Inc. | G00780827
 Description:

Hyperautomation involves the combined use of multiple technologies within a process to

enable an accumulation effect that moves the organization away from simple task
automation to an orchestrated use of technologies, tools and platforms to improve a
business process, often from end to end. Automation tools typically included in
hyperautomation initiatives are robotic process automation, analytics, natural language
processing, optical character recognition, biometrics, AI, ML, chatbots, intelligent business
process management and low-code platforms.

Why Trending:

The 2023 Gartner CIO and Technology Executive Survey found that 13% of higher
education respondents plan to increase their investment in hyperautomation technologies
in 2023, an unsurprising finding, given the significant focus on student and faculty
engagement. Universities are laden with manual and semiautomated business processes
that result in student, employee and faculty satisfaction issues. University staff are
sometimes absorbed in routine tasks that add little value. As institutions continue to be
pressured to reduce costs, automation offers the potential to help make that effort a
reality. Leveraging technology to free staff to perform other critical tasks, while
simultaneously saving money and improving satisfaction, makes these initiatives
increasingly popular.

Implications:

■ Market offerings are abundant, while multiple products and vendor promises may
make technology selection difficult. Institutions will face decisions as to whether to
invest in enterprise-level products versus more niche or education-specific products.

■ Departmental and siloed approaches may result in redundant and overlapping

technologies on campus, requiring governance to ensure the tool portfolio is
rationalized and the optimal tool for each task is employed.

■ Extensive business process analysis will be essential, requiring high business

analysis skill and availability of sufficient data to identify patterns and train the
automation technology solution.

■ Institutions successful with initial hyperautomation initiatives quickly progress

through a series of challenges ranging from “How do I get started?” to issues of
“scale” and how to “prioritize,'’ resulting in an onslaught of opportunities and
requests.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 10 of 20

Actions:

■ Before choosing a hyperautomation technology, partner with stakeholders to identify

specific business outcomes by:

■ Measuring the current state

■ Determining business process redesign opportunities

■ Anticipating business value change from automation

■ Apply automation technologies by breaking down the process needs and aligning
needs with the specific automation tool’s underlying strengths.

■ Track business value achieved from automation by assessing the resulting impact
on factors such as:

■ Revenue increase

■ Cost savings

■ Cost avoidance

■ Error reduction

■ Resource optimization

■ Increased compliance and risk reduction

■ Increased student, faculty and employee satisfaction

Further Reading:

4 Steps to Hyperautomation Success in Higher Education

Infographic: Which Technologies Should You Use for Hyperautomation

Predicts 2023: Education Will See Consolidation, Competition and Creativity

Quick Answer: How Will Autoadapting and Autocomposing Products Enable Digital
Business Disruption

Composable ERP/SIS

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 11 of 20

Analysis by Robert Yanckello, Robert Anderson, Grace Farrell

Description:

Composable ERP is an adaptive technology strategy that supports the foundational

administrative and operational digital capabilities that enable an enterprise to keep up
with the pace of business change. It is not a single, off-the-shelf product; rather, it defines
a strategic technology framework in which application and platform capabilities support
dynamic and user-centric enterprise business capabilities.

Why Trending:

ERP/SIS transformation is critical to business transformation. Legacy administrative

systems are increasingly unsustainable technologically and financially. The need to
support a resilient and future-proof enterprise requires universities and colleges to adopt
an ERP approach that merges dynamic business needs with a dynamic technology
architecture and application strategy.

■ The role of ERP applications is evolving, as it must advance the institution’s

enterprise business capabilities to leverage systems and data across the entire
institution.

■ Composable ERP supports outcome-based objectives, not just technology

preferences, and is designed to be more flexible, data-centric and stakeholder-driven.

■ Institutions are moving beyond traditional ERP offerings and composing their own
modern technology platforms, which include their legacy or new SIS, as well as a
cadre of other digital capabilities.

Implications:

Delivering value is at the core of composable ERP. The ability to deliver value is changing
radically, due to the influx of new technologies, mindsets and practices. Composability
requires understanding new business processes and a commitment to combine strategy,
practice and tools to deliver enterprise digital capabilities that improve outcomes and
demonstrate quantifiable benefits. It will compel institutions to think and act differently
about:

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 12 of 20

■ Business outcomes — A shift of focus away from “how” to invest to “why” to invest,
and what can be achieved.

■ Complexity — Accepting complexity and working toward managing ERP is a must.

Trying to reduce the challenge through a single-vendor approach is a mistake.

■ Customer value creation — How to understand and keep pace with customers’
demands.

Actions:

■ Establish the scope of what ERP means — and should mean — for your organization
by evaluating current technology capabilities, outlining the desired future state and
the alignment with business plans and desired institutional objectives.

■ Ensure that business and IT collaborate to create a composable ERP strategy by

engaging a broad range of stakeholders to identify the various business services
and scenarios requiring new or more-innovative ways of delivering services and
improving experiences.

■ Invest in enabling technologies along the core ERP journey by deploying enterprise
modernization capabilities that are cloud-capable, standards-based and support new
digital initiatives that leverage innovations like:

■ AI

■ Advanced integration tools

■ Hyperautomation

■ Workflow orchestration

■ Business intelligence

Further Reading:

Predicts 2022: Composable Applications Accelerate Digital Business

 Hype Cycle for ERP, 2022

Technical Capabilities
Cybersecurity — Threat Intelligence

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 13 of 20

Analysis by Robert Yanckello and Craig Lawson

Description:

Threat intelligence is evidence-based knowledge, including context, mechanisms,

indicators, implications and action-oriented advice about an existing or emerging menace
or hazard to assets. This intelligence can be used to inform decisions regarding the
subject’s response to that menace or hazard.

Why Trending:

According to the 2023 Gartner CIO and Technology Executive Survey, in higher education,
cyber/information security remains a priority investment again in 2023 for universities
and colleges. There is ongoing concern that universities make relatively soft targets for
cyberattackers. Higher education institutions are viewed as a target-rich environment due
to the large amount of sensitive data, intellectual property and personally identifiable
information they maintain for students, research and operations. 6 As security threats
continue to be pervasive, more institutions are taking advantage of threat intelligence (TI)
tools and services monitoring network traffic for anomalies and mitigating threats. 7

■ The higher education sector has seen a rapid increase in the number and severity of
1
cyberattacks since 2020.

■ Limited security resources, as well as the complex and evolving security solution
market, make it challenging to effectively prepare and respond to threats and
attacks.

■ According to the  Microsoft Security Intelligence site, education is one of the most
affected industries for threat activity.

Implications:

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 14 of 20

Security leaders have an obligation to understand the organization’s threat landscape, but
remain (overall) immature at quantifying their organizations cyberoperational risk. TI
directly assists with this goal. Security leaders must ensure their security solutions are
updated with the latest content and provide contextual information to their teams, as this
helps them inform overall risk. TI provides the means for an organization to maintain the
visibility of their threat landscape, and build timely, accurate and applicable insight that
can be applied before, during and after threats present themselves to the organization.

Globally, regulatory compliance and the threat landscape are growing in complexity and
forcing institutions to address security and risk issues in a multidimensional approach,
with increased collaboration across the sector. As public- and private-sector industries
address the challenges of increasing cyberattacks and a shortage of IT talent, higher
education institutions have increased their focus on cybersecurity training, as well as
securing their own growing networks. Several universities are now partnering with one
another through the newly formed Consortium of Cybersecurity Clinics to share best
practices and help others secure their networks.

Actions:

Higher education CIOs must work closely with security leaders to confront the threat
landscape on a risk-based approach:

■ Align TI program goals to business risks and use TI to formulate security operation
goals. Senior leaders are more likely to approve funding for solutions that improve
risk mitigation, increase efficiency or reduce cost.

■ Join and contribute to TI sharing programs to crowdsource efforts against threat

actors, while assuaging business concerns with privacy or sensitive data exposure.

■ Develop organizational resiliency with strong backup and incident response plans to
prepare against attacks that can’t be prevented or detected.

Further Reading:

 Hype Cycle for Security Operations, 2022

Market Guide for Security Threat Intelligence Products and Services

Classroom Evolution

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 15 of 20

Analysis by Tony Sheehan, Paul Riley, Saher Mahmood

Description:

Classroom evolution describes the continued exploration, redesign and evolution toward
effective use of teaching spaces and enabling technologies. Many colleges and
universities were forced to deliver online due to the pandemic and then moved to support
hybrid and HyFlex teaching strategies as campuses reopened.

Why Trending:

■ The COVID-19 pandemic, associated recovery funds and the emergence of so-called
HyFlex/hybrid teaching strategies encouraged many higher education institutions to
make significant new investments in classroom technology.

■ Typically, these investments have taken the form of technologies to enable:

■ Lecture capture

■ Synchronous video streaming and collaboration

■ Fixed-focus cameras, evolving to the use of classroom cameras to follow and

capture video of instructors and sometimes students in the class

■ Enhanced audio, including beam-forming microphones in the classroom to

capture student participation in the room and share it with remote participants

■ Knowledge sharing via digital whiteboards and document cameras

■ Institutions have invested in training faculty how to leverage these classroom

technologies, as synchronous delivery demands new styles of delivery and
engagement. Many faculty continue to adjust to this new modality, and both student
and faculty feedback on the experience has been variable. 8

■ Evolution of faculty teaching style — in particular approaches to formative

assessment 9 and the ability to involve remote synchronous students — has proved
to be key to engagement. 10 Those students forced to listen passively to livestreams
without interaction tend to disengage and become demotivated. 11

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 16 of 20

■ A considerable amount of initial investment in classroom technology was
“technology push,” fueled by the availability of pandemic-related funding, rather than
need. As institutions reset strategies toward 2030, many are now reevaluating both
impact and appropriateness of classroom strategies and technologies for the future.

Implications:

■ It is now becoming clear that synchronous instruction demands different learning

designs and may undermine full participation of working adult learners 12 or the 23%
of online learners who want to learn at a pace that suits them. 13

■ Hybrid and HyFlex modalities and associated classroom technologies create a

considerable burden on instructors to redesign teaching in a way that exploits new
technology and engages students in two locations simultaneously. Although some
institutions have assigned teaching assistants and technologists to support this new
instruction type, this support can significantly increase institutional classroom
delivery costs as well as pressures on teaching staff.

■ Sustaining classroom technologies requires ongoing funding (which has been

14
estimated at 20% of the initial outlay per year) has traditionally not been allocated
by colleges or universities, and challenges the review of investments and impacts.

■ The assumption that large volumes of students will continue to seek to attend
synchronously and remotely remains unproven. Institutions offering new attendance
flexibility between on campus or online attendance have discovered limited takeup
by students in this mode. 15 There is also evidence of demands at the undergraduate
level toward campus experiences 16 and more-flexible blended and asynchronous
approaches.

■ Institutions are recognizing that optimal classroom experiences are not constrained
by technology. The combination of physical space design, virtual space design,
teaching and learning design, and technology must evolve in parallel to improve the
classrooms and teaching spaces of the future. 17

■ Although remote synchronous delivery will continue to be a valid mode of future

teaching delivery, it will become part of a mix of synchronous and asynchronous
elements as better faculty practice in online and blended learning emerges (see
Enhance Online Learning Effectiveness Using the Higher Education Online Learning
Maturity Model).

Actions:

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 17 of 20

■ Leverage insights on existing classroom technology investments by stimulating
faculty, student and staff insights on current effectiveness. 18 Distill insights into a
vision of classroom evolution that aligns with institutional strategy, ambitions and
budgets.

■ Target future investments by auditing existing classroom spaces and then

consolidating proposed designs into:

■ A large volume of standardized setups that support core teaching functionality

(web connection, projection and — increasingly — lecture capture).

■ A smaller number of exemplar spaces that facilitate higher levels of hybrid

collaboration for those faculty, subjects and styles of teaching where
significant levels of synchronous interaction are critical. Leverage such spaces
as hubs for faculty training and to stimulate feedback on appropriate future
19
classroom designs.

■ Evolve toward success by refining technology plans and building a community of

practice that preserves collaboration across faculty, IT, students, finance and estates.

Further Reading:

Enhance Online Learning Effectiveness Using the Higher Education Online Learning
Maturity Model

Optimize, Evolve and Innovate Institutional Digital Learning With Your Higher Education
LMS

Innovation Insight for Digital Assessments in Higher Education

 Hype Cycle for Higher Education, 2022

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 18 of 20

Evidence
2023 Gartner CIO and Technology Executive Survey was conducted to help CIOs and
technology executives overcome digital execution gaps by empowering and enabling an
ecosystem of internal and external digital technology producers. It was conducted online
from 2 May through 25 June 2022 among Gartner Executive Programs members and
other CIOs. Qualified respondents are each the most senior IT leader (e.g., CIO) for their
overall organization or some part of their organization (for example, a business unit or
region). The total sample is 2,203 respondents, with representation from all geographies
and industry sectors (public and private). Disclaimer: The results of this survey do not
represent global findings or the market as a whole, but reflect the sentiments of the
respondents and companies surveyed.

1
 Current Term Enrollment Estimate, Spring 2022, National Student Clearinghouse
Research Center.

2
 A Second Demographic Cliff Adds to Urgency for Change | Inside Higher Ed.

3
 New Public Agenda Report: Americans Question the Value of Higher Education, but
Overwhelmingly Agree on Solutions to Improve, Access, Equity, and Affordability, Public
Agenda.

4
 Skills-Based Hiring Is on the Rise, Harvard Business Review, 

5
 A Framework for Student Success Analytics, EDUCAUSE.

6
 Increasing Higher Education Cyberattacks Add to Financial Pressure, Fitch Ratings.

7
 Universities Speed Up Threat Detection With Security Operations Centers, EdTech.

8
 HyFlex Learning: Pros, Cons and the Future, Inside Higher Ed.
9
 Beyond “Lost Learning”: Using Formative Assessment to Support a Return to the
Classroom, The IB Community Blog.

10
 Crossing Borders With the Hybrid Virtual Classroom, Media & Learning.
11
 Exploring Student and Teacher Experiences in Hybrid Learning Environments: Does
Presence Matter?, Postdigital Science and Education 2022.

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 19 of 20

 12
 Student Perspective: An Adult Learner Navigates Asynchronous Online Classes,
EdTech.

13
 Online Learning in a Post-pandemic World: The Future of Learning Report 2022, Future
Learn.

14
 State of Facilities in Higher Education: Exploring Facilities Relevance in a Changing
Environment, Gordian.

15
 Why Portland State University Is Committed to Hybrid Learning, EdTech.
16
 Students Returning to Campus Want the ‘University Experience’ Missed During
COVID-19, The Conversation.

17
 Making Space for Connected Learning: An Ecosystem Approach to Designing
Teaching Spaces in Higher Education Part 1, The University of Sydney Co-Design
Research Group.

18
 Learning Space Rating System, EDUCAUSE.

19
 Technology in Classrooms & Collaboration Spaces, Stevens Institute of Technology.

© 2023 Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Gartner is a registered trademark of
Gartner, Inc. and its affiliates. This publication may not be reproduced or distributed in any form
without Gartner's prior written permission. It consists of the opinions of Gartner's research
organization, which should not be construed as statements of fact. While the information contained in
this publication has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, Gartner disclaims all warranties
as to the accuracy, completeness or adequacy of such information. Although Gartner research may
address legal and financial issues, Gartner does not provide legal or investment advice and its research
should not be construed or used as such. Your access and use of this publication are governed by
Gartner’s Usage Policy. Gartner prides itself on its reputation for independence and objectivity. Its
research is produced independently by its research organization without input or influence from any
third party. For further information, see "Guiding Principles on Independence and Objectivity."

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 20 of 20

Table 1: Trend Profiles

Personalized Learning Operational Improvement Technical Capabilities

Learning Experience Platforms Hyperautomation Cybersecurity — Threat Intelligence

Student Success Analytics Composable ERP/SIS Classroom Evolution

Source: Gartner (February 2023)

Gartner, Inc. | G00780827 Page 1A of 1A

Actionable, objective insight
Explore these additional complimentary resources and tools
for CIOs and other senior technology executives:

eBook eBook
2023 CIO Agenda Gartner Top Strategic
Discover the top priorities CIOs must Technology Trends for 2023
address in 2023. See the 10 trends driving strategic
impact in 2023 and beyond.

Download Now Download Now

Template Tool
IT Strategic Planning Guide Gartner BuySmart™
Turn strategy into action with this one-page Learn how to confidently manage the
IT strategic planning template. technology life cycle.

Download Now Request a Demo

Already a client?
Get access to even more resources in your client portal. Log In
Connect With Us
Get actionable, objective insight to deliver on your mission-critical
priorities. Our expert guidance and tools enable faster, smarter
decisions and stronger performance. Contact us to become a client:

U.S.: 1 844 309 5980

International: 44 (0) 3330 603 939

Become a Client

Learn more about Gartner for IT Executives

www.gartner.com/en/it

Stay connected to the latest insights

© 2023 Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. CM_GTS_2234233