In recent years the use of ICT has become more commonly used in educational contexts, one of these being higher education. The purpose of this essay is to identify and discuss the opportunities and challenges that professionals face when implementing ICT in higher education courses. I also intend to explore the use of Interactive Whiteboards (IWB) in lessons followed by analysis of the Student Response Systems (SRS) used within these lessons. An IWB refers to any whiteboard connected to a computer that has the ability to display a projected image which can then be controlled by the user by touching the whiteboard with their finger or a pen (Beauchamp, 2004). My second chosen theme, Student Response Systems, is defined by Williams et al. (2011) as electronic multimedia remotes that allow students to answer multiple-choice questions and take part in quizzes or Likert-style questions produced on a PowerPoint presentation by the teacher. When discussing the topics covered in this essay, I will include a combination of my ICT-related experiences and recent research conducted examining the use of ICT in higher education. Interactive whiteboards (IWBs) have been present in educational settings for over a decade now. The UK Government was one of the first to use this new educational technology, as part of the National Literacy Strategy and the National Numeracy Strategy. This decision came in response to the apparent need to focus on developing ICT skills within mainstream education if Britain was to remain competitive in an increasingly globalized world (Hockly, 2013). IWBs can be used to enhance learning and encourage student engagement, with four different categories of use. Beau...... middle of paper....... For example, instructors can use SRS only to record attendance (Premkumar & Coupal, 2008). The instructor must ensure that the main focus is on learning and not on portable devices. There are many opportunities available to teachers and students when using IWBs and SRSs in higher education, but there are also many challenges. With the right amount of training, which must be ongoing throughout the implementation, teachers will have the skills and abilities to use these types of ICT effectively to improve and create engagement within their classrooms. Many teachers I saw teach focused too often on the technology and how to make it work and did not have enough time to adapt it to the student's needs. Little by little we are finding ways to overcome these barriers and one day I hope we can use ICT to its full potential.