After August 1, 2024, Microsoft will no longer support Office “Student A1+” licensing. Cornell’s Educational licensing plan previously provided an unlimited number of these licenses.

Who will this affect?

This will affect about 500 Cornell temporary and affiliate employees who were granted this license so that they could install desktop versions of Office apps on devices.

Normally, the affected group’s licensing would revert to the “Faculty A1” licenses on August 1, after which they would lose access to desktop Office 365 applications and only be eligible to use Office Online apps.

How do we plan to ease the transition?

To help ease the transition from desktop to online app access, CIT plans to temporarily assign Microsoft 365 A3 licenses to the affected group until September 15, 2024. After this date, however, their regular A1 level licenses will only allow access to Microsoft 365 Online.

Pete Bosanko from Email Services will join the ITSG meeting on July 30 to answer questions about this upcoming change. Unit and departmental IT groups have been provided with a list of customers in the affected group.

Those losing licensing for Microsoft 365 desktop apps should familiarize themselves with using online Microsoft 365. Educational resources are available on LinkedIn Learning, such as Learning Word Online, Learning Excel Online, and Learning PowerPoint Online.