The Microsoft Office 365 project is a strategic realignment of single sign on (SSO), email, and new service offerings for WSU faculty, staff, and students.
The Office 365 project will be implemented in two phases and consists of multiple service enhancements for faculty, staff, and students on all WSU campuses. When fully implemented this will include:
Phase One (June 30-July 6)
- Single Sign On (SSO) for Office 365 services, such as student email
- Microsoft Office for current students
Phase Two (gradual implementation begins August 2015 with completion targeted for early September)
- OneDrive for Business for current faculty, staff, and students
- Microsoft Office for current faculty and staff
Information Technology Services (ITS) will begin the implementation of Phase One on June 30 with completion targeted for July 6. Phase One will have the following impacts:
- Beginning June 30, ITS will be unable to create any new Office 365 email accounts until July 6.
- From 11 p.m. on July 4 to 8 a.m. on July 6 students and alumni may not be able to log into their student email accounts while ITS enables Office 365 features and makes required email changes.
- On July 6th, the student and alumni login to Office 365 will change from firstname.lastname@email.wsu.edu to NIDusername@wsu.edu (WSU Network ID). (Note: For most Office 365 users, the existing NID is already in the format of firstname.lastname. These users will be less impacted by this change.)
- The login will be the same user ID and password they use for zzusis and Blackboard.
- Users who have two mailboxes (one at Office 365 and one at Central Exchange) please go here http://office365project.it.wsu.edu/DualMailBoxes/DualMailBoxes.aspx for more information.
- Currently enrolled students will be able to download Microsoft Office for free after completion of Phase One by logging into their email at: http://Office365.wsu.edu/
Some of the benefits provided by the Office 365 project include:
- Provides students with just one account and password to remember and improves the on-boarding process (uses the same login for zzusis).
- Microsoft Office will be provided at no cost to current students as well as faculty and staff and at no additional cost to WSU.
- Improves calendaring and scheduling options between Office 365 student users and on premise faculty and staff Central Exchange users.
- OneDrive for Business provides a new university-sanctioned centralized storage service.
Additional project detail and FAQs can be found at: http://office365project.it.wsu.edu
