Dear Members,
I hope this message finds everyone well. Even weeks after the Alliance 2015 conference, I am still in amazed by the level of enthusiasm and energy our community brings to bear. I was so pleased to take part in the conference and contribute to the larger mission of HEUG. Moving forward, I’d encourage you to attend and contribute to regional conferences, contribute to the listserves and reach out to PAG and TAG members to see how you can contribute to the work they’re doing on everyone’s behalf.
Secondly, I wanted to share some thoughts on the future unfolding before us. Our community, and IT in higher education is at a crossroads. At the Alliance conference we all heard the latest developments on the Oracle Student Cloud and Oracle Financial Cloud products. In the coming months and years, institutions with on-premise ERP solutions are going to be grappling with a myriad of questions about these offerings and the implications to their business processes. As pressures to reduce costs and increase efficiencies mount, schools are likely to have little choice but examine possible alternatives to their on-premise systems and/or the intersection of on-premise systems and the cloud. The path your institution takes and story that comes of it will be unique. The issues are complex and to help, the TAG has established this as an area of focus for the coming year and will be working in concert with a Board-established working group to examine cloud offerings and options. This is just one of several important areas of focus for the TAG this year. Please stay tuned for updates on these important efforts.
Finally, I wanted to remind everyone that Oracle recently announced their call for presentations for OpenWorld and JavaOne conferences is now open through April 29, 2015. Please consider submitting a proposal at the links below and sharing your knowledge with others on a broad stage!
OpenWorld Call for Proposals
https://www.oracle.com/openworld/call-for-proposals.html
JavaOne Call for Proposals
https://www.oracle.com/javaone/call-for-proposals.html
Thank you all for your collaboration, engagement and passion.
Terry Houser
HEUG Vice President of Technology