Tom Battaglia, Chief Information Officer at Southern Oregon University, has 17 plus years as an I.T. leader and lead technologist in higher education, government, and the private sector. Tom came to SOU from the Oregon Department of Revenue, where he served as the Deputy Chief Information Officer overseeing 75 employees. Tom gained higher education experience as the University of Montana’s Assistant Chief Information Officer for six years. Prior to that, while at the City of Boulder, Colorado, Tom served in a number of I.T. leadership roles, including Applications Manager, Client Services Manager, Software Development Manager, and Systems Architect.
Tom was drawn to his I.T. career while working on a Ph.D. in Chemistry at the Colorado School of Mines, researching catalysis and ion-exchange with the hope of discovering an approach to lower the energy required to dissociate water into hydrogen and oxygen. Tom found that he enjoyed the computer modeling and computing aspects of the field more than the chemistry itself, and he pivoted to a career in the tech industry. Tom is originally from Denver, Colorado. He is a fly fisherman, drummer, guitarist, and recording engineer.