Michael Staton (@Inigral), CEO and founder of Inigral, which is “reinventing the way Higher Ed uses Facebook,” is speaking on a Social Media Clubhouse panel tomorrow on the ways “organizations can work together to utilize social media and improve higher learning.” (Live feed on Ustream.)

Staton, whose organization is funded in part by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, discussed social media and education and the conference South by Southwest (SXSW) with ASMH.

Image: Inigral CEO Michael Staton with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Source: Inigral.com.

ASMH: How did you first get involved in the panel? Have you been to SXSW before?

MS: I was asked by the UT Social Media Club. I’ve never been to SXSW before, though most of my entrepreneur friends go like religion. This year had so much going on, I couldn’t pass it up.

ASMH: What are some of the most important things educators and education staff can get out of South by Southwest?

MS: I think actually going to the talks NOT about education and understanding more fully the best practices in user-engagement, agile development, user-centered design and analytics woud be more valuable to people in education.

As of today, most folks in education still think of software as having “features” that “solve” administrative or management issues. But the world has changed, and software has been flipped on its head. Software is now user-centered, simple and focuses on engagement rather than features. There are no longer IT issues, but instead there are product design challenges. This paradigm shift is important for educators to understand.

ASMH: What was it about education apps that first drew your attention?

MS: I was teaching High School in Houston, Texas, and I was appalled at the terrible software. I started using the internet – put my assignments online, had a website, had a class blog, used a portfolio system and used the coolest gradebook I could find. I got hooked. I’ve been an education entrepreneur building social apps on the internet ever since. When Facebook Platform launched, Facebook had the loyalty of every college and high school student in the U.S. It was a no-brainer.

ASMH: What are some of the schools that are doing the best job on social media, in your opinion?

MS: My longstanding favorite is Texas A&M, forgive me for saying. I also really dig SCAD and Columbia College, Chicago (both our clients.)

McCombs business school did the first really cool campaign with video competitions on YouTube. Abilene Christian has always dominated mobile. NC State is doing some really cool stuff with both Twitter and Location based services. It’s tough to say, because the ground shifts so rapidly. I would say look for talented people, and the innovation will follow.

ASMH: If you had to predict what one of the major trends in 2011 will be in social media and education, what would you say?

MS:

• Cloud services and consumer apps will start to play a more important role in going to school than the schools IT infrastructure. That’s going to throw IT and Academic Computing for a loop.
• All sorts of cool apps will come out of schools that aren’t known for having serious tech programs, because making web apps and mobile apps is now so accessible. These apps will have trouble getting distribution and spinning off into businesses, but the type of stuff that Purdue has been doing is going to be replicated in many colleges. I’ve already seen awesome stuff come out of Abilene Christian, Oklahoma Christian and Mizzou.
• Location-based services are going to play an increasing role in student engagement and student life.
• Serious competitors to Blackboard are going to start to get traction. Blackboard will get distracted by all the companies it’s acquired.
• The mainstream professors are going to start using consumer apps like Academia.edu.
• Textbooks will start to die. The iPad will start to become the dominant education tool.
• Everyone will have to have a mobile version of everything. As part of this process, people will come out with all sorts of apps that will, in general, fail and be unseated by more successful ones.
• Tuition has hit a ceiling. Everyone will try to do more with less. People will get laid off, and schools will realize that their online interface is as important as their physical one.
• University presidents not talking about social media and actively using it will get left in the dust.