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Some educational institutions face issues when trying to upend their entire system, overhauling the storage and background systems and the interfaces students and staff use, which Davidson College CIO Raechelle Clemmons says can be a heavy financial load. In terms of expense, it may be an easier sell to universities to begin with cloud storage. Universities could also see cost savings keeping support and repair staff and systems off-site; for example, as the transition from campus cards to mobile apps takes shape, it becomes clear that contracting off-campus can sometimes reduce costs.

Still, there are legitimate concerns over how secure cloud storage can be; the potential pitfalls of a hacked server can be enormous, from malware, to theft of research or harassment of students on their private school accounts. Susan Grajek, the vice president of data, research and analytics at EDUCAUSE, noted last fall that there have been escalations in security breaches on cloud servers used by colleges, but that is likely because the number of colleges employing cloud storage is growing exponentially. She said that with the increase in focus on the cloud, there is also an increase in attention paid to securing that data.

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UTC aims to move IT services and storage to cloud - Education Dive