Increasingly, institutions are grappling with the reality that they must have good plans in place to quickly provide access to networks, IT services, and digital content if disaster strikes.  On-campus disruptions, including local violent acts or massive power outages, may precipitate the need to activate an emergency plan, or natural disasters may provide the impetus.  In addition, major disruptions or outages from commercial content providers or cloud services could have negative consequences for research projects and teaching and learning activities.  Outsourcing creates dependences that need to be identified, analyzed, and taken into account when managing risk.  What can institutions realistically plan for, and how can they assess the risks of locally provided content, cloud services, and content provided from vendors’ own systems?

Teams from 10 higher education institutions described their experiences, concerns, strategies, and future plans during a discussion of these and other issues that took place at the CNI Executive Roundtable in Arlington, VA on December 12, 2011.