Chris Hartigan
VP, Higher Education and Verticals
Acquia, Inc.
Recent blog posts
Posted on Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - 14:06
Looking for a Lift: Why Clark University Chose Drupal and the Acquia Platform
A Q&A with Matt Cyr, Director of Content Marketing
I recently had the opportunity to talk to Matt Cyr, Director of Content Marketing at Clark University in Worcester,
More... Posted on Tuesday, September 9, 2014 - 13:19
Drupal is used to run some of the largest web sites at some of the largest universities in the world. Massive institutions like University of Minnesota (64,000 students), Ohio State University (65,000 students), Austin Community College (70,000
More... Posted on Wednesday, May 21, 2014 - 09:37
Being in the cloud business we often hear the phrase, “don’t let your best day be your worst day.” It’s certainly a risk that any school that hosts it’s own websites faces.
A couple of weeks ago an elite, very well known school in the Northeast had
More... Posted on Tuesday, May 13, 2014 - 12:12
Higher Education institutions rely on their websites to tell their story through rich and engaging digital experiences.
In this rapid age of innovation, it is imperative that educational establishments are able to attract and enroll the best
More... Posted on Monday, March 10, 2014 - 09:06
While colleges and universities are not ecommerce businesses they still do a great deal of ecommerce. From online bill payments for class registration, to payments for fines, infractions and permits, to dining plans and other related student
More... Posted on Monday, February 24, 2014 - 16:46
Web accessibility in higher education is not a new topic. For over 15 years most institutions have been working to insure that their web accessibility adheres to the standards and protocols set forth in Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1998
More... Posted on Thursday, January 2, 2014 - 08:40
Malcolm Gladwell’s 2000 best seller The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference describes how certain “ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread like viruses” throughout our society and how they take hold and transform
More... Posted on Monday, December 16, 2013 - 15:18
My position on MOOCs is a confused one.
I believe that the current higher education model in the United States, with its high costs and questionable outcomes, is unsustainable. But at the same time I recognize that the industry has been criticized
More... Posted on Tuesday, December 10, 2013 - 13:50
Acquia CMO Tom Wentworth’s recent post about the unimaginative use of stale FUD by proprietary CMS vendors who try to spook buyers away from open source content management systems was spot on. Not only does this negative message cast doubt on the
More... Posted on Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - 10:09
IES Abroad is one of the largest and most notable operators of study abroad programs in the world. I recently had the opportunity to talk with Richard Bartecki, EVP of Marketing, to better understand how their Drupal strategy is helping support
More... Posted on Wednesday, September 25, 2013 - 09:23
Georgia Tech’s new website is fantastic. Engaging, clean, informative, it really helps tell the impressive and dynamic story of who Georgia Tech is, where the school has been and where it is going. Granted the previous site wasn’t all that
More... Posted on Wednesday, September 18, 2013 - 09:08
Over the past several weeks I’ve had more conversations with schools about alumni sites and alumni portals than I can even count. Big schools and small, public and private, are exploring and evaluating options for their next (or in some cases,
More... Posted on Wednesday, September 4, 2013 - 16:17
At our higher education Meetup last week in Atlanta (http://higheredmeetupatlanta.drupalgardens.com/#), Savannah College of Art and Design (our host school) presented their new Drupal web site and talked about how it’s impacting their overall
More... Posted on Tuesday, August 20, 2013 - 13:33
Higher education IT organizations today face two major challenges: They must manage through day-to-day hurdles while also preparing for the technology challenges – and opportunities – of tomorrow. At our EDU Meetup earlier this month in Washington
More... Posted on Monday, August 5, 2013 - 15:01
I was a little surprised at how dominant the topic of responsive design was at last week’s EduWeb Conference in Boston. By all accounts, it was a great conference. A wide breadth of institutions provided many perspectives and the quality of the
More... Posted on Tuesday, July 16, 2013 - 13:47
I remember being at Gartner Symposium in Orlando years ago and sitting in one of Mike Zastrocky’s presentations and listening him talk about the issue of an aging IT demographic bearing down on colleges and universities. Mike’s warning was meant to
More... Posted on Monday, June 10, 2013 - 12:36
Some schools talk about building online communities to foster collaboration and many schools just dream of it. But a few schools actually do it. Oxford University’s Said Business School (SBS), which recently launched its Global Opportunities &
More... Posted on Tuesday, June 4, 2013 - 07:46
Acquia’s Higher Education Meetup at DrupalCon was a success, but don’t just take our word for it. Scott Lozier, Senior Drupal Developer at Bentley University, attended the Meetup and said afterwards, “I love hearing real stories from other Higher
More... Posted on Thursday, May 16, 2013 - 10:33
Nearly 20% of the registered attendees at next week’s DrupalCon are from higher education institutions. Will you be one of them?
Drupal is having a major impact in higher education and based on the registration list alone it appears that the
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