Executive Summary

The annual Horizon Report describes the continuing work of the NMC’s Horizon Project, a research-oriented effort that seeks to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have a large impact on teaching, learning, or creative expression within higher education. The 2007 Horizon Report is the fourth edition in this annual series. Again this year, as in years past, the report reflects an ongoing collaboration between the New Media Consortium and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI), an EDUCAUSE program.

The core of the report describes six areas of emerging technology that will impact higher education within three adoption horizons over the next one to five years. To identify these areas, the project draws on an ongoing conversation among knowledgeable persons in the fields of business, industry, and education; on published resources, current research and practice; and on the expertise of the NMC and ELI communities. Many of the examples under each topic area feature the innovative work of NMC or ELI member institutions. The Horizon Project’s Advisory Board surveys the field to identify significant trends and challenges in higher education, investigates possible topics for the Report, and ultimately directs the selection of the six topics that appear here.

The focus of the Horizon Project centers on the applications of emerging technologies to teaching, learning, and creative expression, and the format of the Horizon Report reflects that focus. Each topic includes an overview to familiarize readers with the concept or technology at hand, a discussion of the particular relevance of the topic to those activities, and examples of how the technology is being or could be applied. Each description is followed by an annotated list of additional examples and readings which expand on the discussion in the Report.