Overview

The Microsoft School Agreement (MSA) is a simple and flexible subscription licensing scheme specifically created to address the unique needs of primary and secondary schools. Through a flexible and simple format, it allows schools to choose which products they wish to deploy on their PC's, making it easier to licence and distribute software with significant cost savings.

How does a Schools Agreement work?

Unit Count:
To initially qualify to participate in the Schools Agreement you must reach a minimum level of 50 units. The Agreement is based on counting the total number of eligible machines (an eligible machine classes as any Pentium II and above, G3 MAC and above as well as any older machines on which software will be installed and run) in your primary school, secondary school or LEA and then multiplying that by the number of products you wish to use on these machines. All eligible machines must be counted. This figure you reach at the end of this process is your unit count. For example:

Example 1: 25 PC's needing Office Professional (1 Unit) and Windows Professional Upgrade (1 unit) = 50 Units
Example 2: 18 PC's licensing the Desktop Platform (3 Units) = 54 Units

Unit Vales of Products
To see a table outlining the unit values of each product sold through MSA please click here.

Once the products have been selected and the unit count verified an agreement between the school and Microsoft is then signed.

Agreement:
With MSA customers sign a Master Agreement and a Subscription Order Form. The Master Agreement enrolls the school into the program and is a perpetual agreement with no expiration date. Once a Master Agreement is in place, Subscription Order Forms are submitted to elect the products for purchase. The schools have the option of taking out a standard one year subscription, or they can opt for a three year term. With the three year term, pricing is set at year 1 and is guaranteed for the remaining term of the agreement. This enables them to build their technology budget forecast with a full understanding of the selected products per-unit pricing for the three year period.

Student Option and Work at Home rights:
As part of the Schools Agreement, institutions have the option to license software for students own use. The Student Option grants annual licenses to the specific number of students selected by the institution for use of products on their personal computer. Qualification into the student option requires 100 units minimum to be ordered on top of the minimum requirement for the institution. There is no requirement to license all the students, it is up to the institution to select who they wish to include on this scheme. The institution take on the responsibility of ensuring the software is used within the terms of the agreement - mainly ensuring that if the student leaves the institution they either buy out the software onto a perpetual license or de-install the software completely.

In addition to the Student Option, MSA also offers Work at Home rights for faculty members (or for students using laptops owned by the institution). The Work at Home rights do not provide unlimited rights to run the software at home. They can ONLY be used for work related purposes. Institutions should not extend the Work at Home rights if they are concerned the right might not be properly understood or observed by their faculty/staff or for any other reasons. Institutions do not get charged for any software used under Work at Home, but they do have to declare how many units will be utilised in this way. Not all products are covered under Work at Home, for instance server products and CALs can not be used in this way.

Price Levels

There are 2 pricing levels available under MSA, these are outlined below:

Adding or Removing Products

Additional products can be added to an existing subscription enrolment at any time during the year. (Note that the full year price will be charged and the coverage term will match the existing enrolment).

On 3 year agreements, institutions are not allowed to remove products below that of the number set on the initial term, but if they have added products throughout the agreement, they can choose to de-install any of these additional product they no longer need.

Expiration of the Agreement

At the end of an MSA agreement there are a couple of options to be considered. The institution can:

• Renew the agreement for either 1 or 3 years
• Exit MSA and remove all the software
• Exit MSA and upgrade to a perpetual licence through the "buy out" option

Please contact the licensing team on 0870 402 0040 for quotes, or email quote requests to licensing@bluesolutions.co.uk