Page 14 - Campus Technology, October/November 2018

CLOUD COMPUTING
GAMECHANGER
RETHINKING HOW TECHNOLOGY IS USED IN EDUCATION
The survey polled more than 200 IT professionals from a variety of industries, 10 percent of whom work in education. The survey results suggest that moving to the cloud takes a great deal of time — and focus. Campus technology leaders need to be very deliberate in making the move and develop a cloud migration plan that outlines all of the steps that have to occur and who will be responsible for each of these actions. From a technical aspect, one of priorities for that plan
should be managing and integrating data.
“The IT environment for most institutions includes a mix of
cloud and on-premises services, all generating and using data that are critical to daily operations and long-term decision- making capabilities,” said Betsy Tippens Reinitz, director of the Enterprise IT Program for Educause. “Managing this hybrid environment and making sure that data are managed and integrated properly and securely has become a big challenge for IT leaders.”
In developing your cloud migration strategy, it’s important to understand how the new cloud environment will fit in with your existing data, technologies and workflows. Start by doing a comprehensive audit of your current IT infrastructure, and carefully map each element to the new cloud environment. Application
and technology standardization and consolidation in advance of a cloud migration can reduce complexities and improve IT operations. Make sure you know which existing systems must be able to communicate with new cloud applications and how you will achieve this integration. Map all related workflows as well, and try to streamline these wherever possible.
Through careful planning, you can realize the benefits of moving to the cloud with minimal difficulty. These benefits
IN DEVELOPING YOUR CLOUD MIGRATION STRATEGY, IT’S IMPORTANT TO UNDERSTAND HOW THE NEW CLOUD ENVIRONMENT WILL FIT IN WITH YOUR EXISTING DATA, TECHNOLOGIES AND WORKFLOWS.
can be significant, Reinitz said.
“The capacity, resilience, speed and scalability associated
with cloud technologies offer a level of service that most institutions are not able to provide on their own,” she observed. “And by moving systems out of an on-premises environment, IT leaders have an opportunity to change their focus away from simply providing technical support and toward a richer role through the support and enablement of institutional goals.”
PRODUCED BY: SPONSORED BY:
vectorfusionart/Shutterstock