Hampton Shive may not have had a crystal ball a few years ago when he pushed departments to move to cloud storage instead of using the college鈥檚 servers.
But his foresight helped make the sudden transition in March to teaching online classes and working remotely much easier than it might have been across the district.
Shive, a 25-year 新彩网 employee, was named the recipient of the 3E Award, Emphasis on Excellence and Enrichment, which is the highest award given by the college and is presented each year to a person who embodies the name of the award.
Jackie Granberry, executive director of the 新彩网 Foundation, made the surprise announcement at the recent Raymond Campus Convocation. Typically, the announcement would have been made at May Employee Awards but was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
鈥淗amp has always looked at what is best for 新彩网 and what will move our college forward,鈥 Granberry said.
Shive, a Raymond resident, began as a network engineer and now is associate vice president for Business Services and chief information officer.
He has seen a lot of big changes at the college over the last 25 years in the business operations, delivery methods of courses and evolution of career-technical education programs.
He said he is committed to making sure 新彩网鈥 鈥渢echnology environment is constantly evolving to best support the maximizing of effort available for teaching and learning while streamlining and reducing administrative effort.鈥
Shive said that, with the rise of the smartphone, it became obvious to him that the 鈥渨orld鈥檚 information environment was rapidly moving from a fixed, wired computing model to an anytime, anywhere wireless model. We believed that a strategic shift to cloud technologies was in the long-term best interest of our students and employees due to the increased flexibility for everyone.
鈥淲hat we did not expect was that a five-to-10-year evolution would be compressed into a few weeks due to COVID-19,鈥 Shive said.
But because 新彩网 had already been moving that way, the transition was much easier. He credits the 新彩网 team with making it possible.
鈥淲hile the technology was a key part of this, the most significant element is our people and their willingness to rapidly adapt and change,鈥 he said. 鈥淭he best technology in the world is useless without people that know how to apply it to solve issues and meet needs.鈥
As Mississippi鈥檚 largest community college, 新彩网 is a comprehensive institution offering quality, affordable educational opportunities with academic programs of study leading to seamless university transfer and career and technical programs teaching job-ready skills. With six locations in central Mississippi, 新彩网 enrolls about 12,000 students each fall semester. To learn more, visit or call 1.800.新彩网CC.