Mobile applications at a mega university: Anadolu University campus app

Ozgur Yilmazel and Erk Ekin
Anadolu University
Eskisehir, Turkey

This paper explores the use of mobile applications to aid on-campus and off-campus students at a mega university. Anadolu University is the world's second largest university in terms of enrolment. With over 1,900,000 students from over 30 different countries, the University serves a very large student body with widely varying demographics. From its early days, the University used various means to access its students. However, during the last decade, with the introduction of mobile technologies and smartphones, students' expectations have changed — they expect to be in contact with their educational institutions without any barriers. Anadolu University released its first mobile campus app on the iOS platform in May 2012. Students adopted the app quickly and the mobile app user community requested new functionalities. Since then, the University has made three major and over 25 minor releases of the app on both iOS and Android. This paper describes the lifecycle of the University's campus app and its evolution over the years. It is widely accepted by both on-campus and off-campus students; and the increasing number of users gives an insight into the high rate of adoption of smartphones.