At a conference I attended in the States a couple of years ago, I was repeatedly struck by the high esteem in which JISC is held internationally. Here in the UK, we may gaze across the Atlantic with envy at the resourcing of individual institutions (or at least we used to before the downturn), but we shouldn’t underestimate the value of a structure such as JISC that operates at a sectoral level in terms of the infrastructural and collaborative benefits that such an approach affords, and the economies of scale that can potentially be delivered.

Talis was a sponsor of last week’s JISC Conference 2010, and during the same week, I received an invitation to a forthcoming 45 minute supplier briefing for JISC’s Flexible Services Delivery Programme in London. In considering whether to attend, two related questions in particular started nagging away at me. Firstly, is this supplier briefing a new silo in the making? And secondly, is the project-specific nature of the event also a tad silo-esque?

My feeling is that the challenges facing our higher education sector are so deep, and the need for innovative solutions and supporting infrastructure so great, that JISC needs to transform itself into a collaborative eco-system in which suppliers play their part alongside (not separate from) learning technologists; librarians; academics – in short everyone who can contribute ideas. At the end of the day, we are all working on solutions to the same problems. At the moment, it’s difficult to engage with JISC at any other than a detailed level, usually in the form of an individual project. Yet the JISC Strategy 2010-12 reveals that broad-brush strategic thinking is taking place somewhere in the JISC structure. Doesn’t this need to be opened up to influences right across the sector? Talis is a major UK supplier of library and learning technology, and yet has only a sporadic relationship with JISC. Most suppliers have a longstanding global focus that JISC should arguably be tapping into, as it increasingly collaborates at an international level. A 45 minute briefing for one particular project is unlikely to make much of a difference.

In these straitened times in which JISC is more accountable for sector-wide outcomes than ever before, it makes sense to aggregate the ideas and experiences of all the stakeholders in higher education, doesn’t it? From students to suppliers, aren’t we all relevant? Or do you think that JISC is already engaging sufficiently with stakeholders such as suppliers?