Few weeks ago I got some great responses to this Q about bringing in critical views on edtech and digital education to universities. Thanks! I went with 5 themes ICYI...

1 Contesting predetermined "futures" of education. Consultants, tech, edtech, intl orgs, all imagine futures of ed. But as @Kerileef argues, these are often tech determinist and narrow - other "preferrable" edu futures can/ should be imagined and acted on. unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000375792.locale=en

2 Confronting commercial edtech mergers and monopolies. 2U bought edX, Anthology acquired Blackboard, Turnitin took in Ouriginal. How should universities respond when new mega-edtech oligopolies or monopolies have power and aims to shape the forms of HE? codeactsineducation.wordpress.com/2021/09/17/nudging-assets/

3 Dealing with automation. Robots may not take over teachers' jobs, but an accumulation of micro-automations will affect teaching, learning, research, admin and management. HEIs have hard Qs to consider and should ask them now. link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s42438-021-00263-3

4 What happens when "clouds" become the default infrastructure? The big cloud operators are absorbing universities and edtech into their technoeconomic biz models and architectures. Does this mean a loss of data and infrastructure control? arxiv.org/abs/2104.09462

5 The need for more of an eco-justice commitment regarding edtech. Are imaginaries of digital transformation threatening to the environment? We need solutions sustainable for the planet too. journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/20427530211022951

None of it very immediately practical I admit, but I do think these are things all universities ought to be collectively addressing - among many other things of course.

If you want more research-based material on the future of universities to get conversations starting, a few more papers I've been leaning on pretty heavily include this on assetization in HE by @J_Kom_ link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10734-020-00639-7

This paper on "programming the platform university", reporting on a HE conversion to the cloud and its data lakes, by @carloper, is essential reading too.

Clouds, assetization, datafication, platforms - this stuff needs raising. journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0034523720965623