Just before Alliance, I wrote about the HEUG's strategic planning process. Many of you were able to attend our annual members meeting at Alliance in Denver, during which we discussed some of the details of that plan. Chris Pondish, our VP for Communications and Membership recently wrote about the steps we are taking to execute that plan. You will soon see posted to HEUG Online a master schedule of the events, conferences, and meetings we have planned for the entire year. As we developed our action plans and this schedule, we have been able to see -- almost for the first time in its entirety -- the scope of our organization. The view is, in a word, breathtaking.
In March I wrote that we are seeking the answers to a series of questions. The first was "how do we best serve our membership globally?" As you will see over the coming months, we are making great strides toward answering this question. Next month I will attend the first formal meeting of our HEUG EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) Community in London. Our EMEA representative on the Board of Directors, Jane Broad from Liverpool John Moores University, has hit the ground running this year and is taking all of the required steps to formalize this community. The same effort is taking place for our community in the Asia Pacific region under the leadership of Board member Tommy Hor from the National University of Singapore. Of course North America is a region as well, and under the leadership of Kathy Pfeiffer from Duke University and Stan Jakubik from the University System of Maryland, HEUG will for the first time this year offer a series of regional events around the United States.
The second question I asked was "how do we interact with our growing Oracle and other vendor partners?" As Oracle grows and evolves, we will need to keep pace with our members as they adopt new technology and applications -- while supporting existing technology and application lines. You likely read a post recently by Paul Czarapata, our VP for Products and Executive VP, that the first Fusion applications customer has gone live. While Fusion is far out on the horizon for most of our members, it is most definitely in sight. This is only one of the Oracle technology and application offerings (a very large one, granted); how will we continue to keep up with and for our members? We will continue to see an increased effort around collaborating with our peer user groups this year in a deliberate effort to keep our members informed and look for more ways to advocate on your behalf.
The third question had less to do with specific applications and technology and more to do with our industry itself: "how do we understand the changing industry in order to advocate on its behalf?" In order to answer this question, we need to increase our ability to look ahead. Under the leadership of Board member Fred Damiano from Hobart and William Smith Colleges, HEUG will extend and enhance our executive engagement program for the year beyond our annual Executive Forum held at the Alliance Conference. This is an exciting venture and we look forward to having an active executive-level community participating in HEUG activities throughout the year. We will also look to collaborate with other industry organizations. Steve Hahn, our VP for External Relations, and I will attend this year's EDUCAUSE Enterprise conference in Chicago with next month as part of our efforts to engage with other higher education industry groups.
I hope that gives you some insight into a few of the efforts we have taken on this year for the benefit of our members. We will, as always, report on our progress and look forward to your continued feedback. As you can see from just this glimpse, the view of the future of our organization is, as I said, breathtaking.