Quoting from the President's Charge to the Commission,

Stanford's ability to retain its position as a preeminent institution of higher education in the 21st century will depend to a significant extent on how the University employs technology in teaching and learning. Technology offers the potential to enhance Stanford's academic leadership position and reputation world-wide. Appropriate use of information resources can increase faculty productivity; help to attract, retain, and engage the brightest students; enrich students' learning experiences and faculty teaching methods. Technology may enhance income opportunities for the University and potentially reduce costs of delivering education. It can allow Stanford to become a truly world-wide institution of learning, reaching out to new types of students and embracing the concept of life-long learning through new models of continuing education. Technology also offers the potential to forge new partnerships with industry, the government, and other educational institutions that will foster research and scholarship as well as teaching.

Thus, the mission of the President's Commission on Technology is to recommend policies, set future directions, identify obstacles and ways of removing them, and initiate pilot projects that offer the potential to enrich Stanford's teaching and learning through technology. The goal is to enhance the quality of a Stanford education while maintaining the highest standards of admission and certification. The challenge facing the Commission is to identify key issues ... and initiate those actions which offer potentially broad application, rather than develop only a set of recommendations and predictions for the future.