The year 2020 has been one of disruption and extraordinary circumstances, and for the foreseeable future the higher education landscape will look nothing quite like it has ever looked before. Many colleges and universities are now in the position of deciding whether their campus will restore, evolve, or transform their operations in 2021. Institutions are also working to determine how they will achieve the most fundamental but complex goals of ensuring the health and safety of all students, staff, and faculty while also providing access to an exceptional education in multiple pedagogical modes.

The arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic on the higher education scene has catalyzed a sweeping migration of courses and services to online or remote modalities, and technology leaders in particular have been called upon to help institutions adapt and implement solutions that simultaneously enable both student success and safety. Indeed, "health and safety," new to the IT Issues survey this year, was rated the single most influential trend for institutions' IT strategy in 2021. Also new to the survey this year, "racial injustice" was rated by technology leaders as the seventh most influential trend for institutions' IT strategy in 2021, evidence of another defining feature of 2020, particularly in the United States: widespread protests and racial tensions in response to several highly publicized African-American deaths by law enforcement, and the demand for change and justice across all sectors of life, including higher education.

The institutional capability to forecast, adapt to, and become responsive to the larger social, cultural, economic, environmental, and political trends taking shape in the world around and within higher education will perhaps be more important in 2021 than ever. This report offers a closer look at those trends that technology leaders believe will be most important for institutions to plan for and adapt to in 2021. Institutional leaders and practitioners can use this information to advance their own institution's capabilities and to be better equipped for the continued changes and disruptions ahead and for the digital transformations that are sure to be required to address them.

These trends were identified through an EDUCAUSE survey conducted in the summer of 2020 and completed by 324 US institutions. This report focuses on the 2021 Trend Watch, a summary of survey responses to a list of trends and their anticipated level of institutional influence. Trends are pervasive external factors that influence institutional and IT strategy and often shape the adoption of technologies. This report examines the trends that institutions are paying the most attention to and that are influencing emerging institutional IT strategy the most. This year's trend list included 24 items.

• The four trends exerting the most influence on higher education's IT strategy in 2021 are (1) health and safety, (2) privacy, (3) IT accessibility, and (4) simplifying administrative services and technologies. Three of these four trends—health and safety, IT accessibility, and simplifying administrative services and technologies—are new to the "most influential trends" list this year, clearly illustrating the shifts in priorities institutions have experienced during 2020 in migrating, adapting, and streamlining their operations. Privacy was rated a "most influential trend" for a second year, moving up from fourth most influential last year to second most influential this year.
• Among the trends that will be "taking hold" in 2021, racial injustice was new to the IT Issues survey this year, while three trends—evaluation of technology-based instructional innovations, user-centered design, and lifelong learning and adult learners—are increasing in influence, up from a "worth understanding" rating last year.
• Two trends that were rated last year to have a "limited impact"—national political uncertainty and declining international enrollments—are now considered "worth understanding" for 2021.
• The Internet of Things trend experienced a drop this year, down from "worth understanding" last year to "limited impact" this year.

This is the seventh year that EDUCAUSE has tracked the influence of major trends on the IT strategy of colleges and universities. Some trends, such as online and blended degree or certificate programs and the digital transformation of research and scholarship are rooted in technology. But we also track social and environmental trends—such as racial injustice and lifelong learning and adult learners—that can influence institutional priorities and, in turn, technology strategy. We assessed the trends presented in this report via an EDUCAUSE survey in the summer of 2020. The influence of the trends that we studied ranged widely (see figure 1), with some affecting as many as three in four institutions and others affecting fewer than one in four. To help readers focus their attention, we divide the trends into four groupings, according to the impact they are having across institutions: most influential, taking hold, worth understanding, and limited impact.

Acknowledging the unique demands of 2020 for institutional planning and strategy, we encourage readers to consider these results alongside this year's Top 10 IT Issues results and in light of each institution's particular context and circumstances. The question of whether institutions will be working to restore their traditional operations or practices in a given area or will choose to evolve or transform those operations or practices into something new is likely to color readers' interpretations of these findings and their implications for the institution.

Four trends are influential at 61% or more of colleges and universities (listed below from highest to lowest level of influence):

• Health and safety
• Privacy
• IT accessibility
• Simplifying administrative services and technologies

Seven trends are influential at 41–60% of institutions (listed below from highest to lowest level of influence):

• Higher education's reputation and relevance
• Online and blended degree or certificate programs
• Racial injustice
• Evaluation of technology-based instructional innovations
• User-centered design
• Shared services
• Lifelong learning and adult learners

The influence of 10 trends is limited to 21–40% of institutions (listed below from highest to lowest level of influence):

• National and global political uncertainty
• Cross-institutional partnerships and consortia
• Moving from transactional to strategic vendor–institution relationships
• Blending of roles and blurring of boundaries between IT and academic/administrative/research areas
• External partnerships with employers, corporations, and communities
• Investing in research
• Changing faculty roles (focus on advising and student success, growth in adjuncts, new methods of research and publication, etc.)
• Digital transformation of research and scholarship
• Declining international enrollments
• Solution providers bypassing IT to work directly with business-area leaders

• Alternative credentialing models
• Internet of Things
• Mergers and acquisitions