Microsoft Campus Agreement

 

MCSA background information

We first joined the Microsoft Campus Agreement program (at the campus level) in 2003.  Our initial agreement ran for three years, which made subsequent annual renewals relatively straightforward.  In 2006, we "refreshed" the agreement by "truing up" the faculty/staff counts on which license costs are based and by rebidding the cost of specific software selections.  This provided an opportunity for various units to reevaluate their software choices in view of changing needs and a substantially expanded list of titles included in the Campus Agreement program.  This year, 2009, we must again renew and refresh the agreement.

For those who are unfamiliar with the Campus Agreement program, the Microsoft software covered by the program can be licensed at extremely low cost compared with retail or even most discounted pricing.  For any campus entity (e.g., Student Affairs or the School of Business Administration) licensing costs are based upon a calculated "FTE" count for the entire unit, not on the actual number of copies of the software the entity may need.  As a result, the program can be extremely cost-effective for software that is used widely throughout the unit but may not be cost-effective for software that will be used by only a few people within the unit.

Some software is centrally purchased for the entire UM-Missoula campus at no cost to offices or departments.  Notably, this includes a campus-wide "desktop package" that includes upgrades to the latest version of the Windows operating system, the Microsoft Office Enterprise suite (Outlook, Work, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, etc., as well as Office 2008 for Macintosh), and what are known as "Core CALs."  (A CAL is a Client Access License that gives a campus user "legal" access to various server-based applications such as the campus Exchange e-mail system.)  The Campus Agreement program also includes other software that can be purchased at the college-/school-/sector-wide level as described below.

Calculating campus unit FTE

First, to reiterate, licensing is based solely upon the number of full-time and part-time faculty and staff that each unit has.  Initially, we obtained these counts from Human Resource Services.  Subsequently, we have asked each year that each unit head verify and update these counts.  From these counts, Microsoft calculates what they term the "FTE" as follows:

FTE = # of full-time faculty + # of full-time staff + 1/3 # of part-time faculty + 1/2 # of part-time staff

Together with the cost per FTE of each specific software title, this calculated "FTE" forms the basis for determining the cost of ordering software titles.  Here's how this works:

Suppose, for example, that Information Technology needs 50 copies of Microsoft Visio for its staff.  If the calculated FTE for Information Technology is 68, then the license cost is calculated using 68 times the unit price for Visio rather than 50 times that price.  The advantage of doing this comes from the reduced price of the software that is available through the Campus Agreement program.  In this example, the cost of Visual Studio to UM departments for the last three years has been $4.37 per FTE compared with a price of about $100 through the Bookstore's Microsoft Select program or a normal retail price of about $560.  So, despite having to purchase a greater number of licenses, the cost of acquiring this software through the Campus Agreement program would be about $300 compared with about $5,000 if 50 licenses were purchased through Microsoft Select or about $28,000 through normal retail channels.

Obviously, in this example, if Information Technology needed just one or two copies of Visio, it would be better to purchase them through the Bookstore's Microsoft Select program (2 copies X $100/copy = $200 vs. 68 FTE X $4.37/FTE =~$300).  So, each unit should carefully consider what software it does or does not want to purchase through the Campus Agreement program.

Additional notes regarding the MCSA program 

• First, software licenses acquired through the Campus Agreement program must be renewed annually, in contrast with the one-time purchases to which we may be accustomed through retail channels.  However, software licensed through the Campus Agreement program includes any available periodic version updates, which retail purchases do not.
• Second, software licensed through UM's Campus Agreement program is available only to (and for) University departments and offices.  It is NOT available for student use except for software that is installed in University-managed computer labs.
• Third, if you are not already aware of it, the Campus Agreement program provides a work-at-home feature that makes software licensed by the University or by campus units available to employees at very low cost.  Questions about the work-at-home program should be directed to the Bookstore.

One final note - for the first six years, we signed 3-year agreements (the longest that Microsoft offers) because it helped hold pricing steady.  However, that had two drawbacks.  First, a commitment for specific software titles that a unit made in the first year, for example, was a commitment that lasted for all three years.  If, in years 2 or 3, the unit found that it didn't want or need the software, the unit was obligated to purchase it anyway.  That didn't happen often but it did happen occasionally.  Second, the University is supposed to "true up" the FTE count every year; however, while Microsoft requires us to report FTE increases, they would not recognize FTE decreases during the course of the 3-year agreement, saying that we were committed at the original level for the full three-year term of the agreement.  So, beginning in 2009, we will run the agreement for just one year at a time to allow units to change software selections as desired and to take advantage of any staffing decreases we may experience. (It seems safe to assume that not many of us will be seeing significant staffing increases in the near future.)

Software titles currently available through the MCSA program

Digital Image Suite	MapPoint	Virtual PC for Mac
Expression Blend	Office Communicator	Visio Professional
Expression Design	Office Groove	Visio Standard
Expression Media	Office Multi Language Pack	Visual Studio 2008 Pro
Expression Media Encoder	OneNote	Windows Server Web
Expression Studio	ProClarity Analytics Desktop Pro	Windows Vista Business
Expression Web	Project	Windows Vista Enterprise
InfoPath	Project Professional	Windows Web Server
InterConnect	Publisher

Other products can be added at any time, subject to the requirement that any order placed must meet a minimum quantity requirement of 300 "units" where a "unit" = 1 software title X 1 FTE.  So, to qualify, an academic unit with 100 FTE would need to order at least three software titles; a unit with 57 FTE would need to order at least four titles; etc.  However, we can combine similar orders for two or more units into a single order to Microsoft if that allows the minimum quantity requirement to be met.

MCSA distribution

Because Information Technology is the recognized contact for the University's Microsoft Campus Agreement, all orders for software through the Campus Agreement program must be placed through IT.