Getting started with your upgrade from Live@edu to Office 365 for education

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Are you planning and preparing for your upgrade to Office 365 from Live@edu?   You may already have been notified that your institution can begin the upgrade. If you haven’t received a notice yet but would like to proceed, contact Live@edu Support to request the upgrade today.   

Where can you find out more information about the upgrade?

1. Live@edu Upgrade Center and Live@edu Upgrade Wiki - mark these sites for all the information and links you need to manage your Live@edu upgrade to Office 365 for education.

2. Live@edu Support - Contact Live@edu Support for assistance during the upgrade process.

3. Getting Started with Office 365 - comprehensive reference on the Office 365 services, setup, features and administration

3. Office 365 Community Site - Stay current on Live@edu and Office 365 topics and get tips from IT peers in our forums, blogs, and wikis.

 

What Office 365 services will be enabled once the upgrade completes?

After the upgrade, your domain(s) will be subscribed to Exchange Online Plan 1, and all accounts will have a new 25GB Exchange Online mailbox. Your institution can now take advantage of new services with Office 365 for education plans  Subscribe to Office 365 for education Plan A2 for free and get SharePoint Online, Lync Online, and Office Web Apps. Students, teachers, and faculty can audio or video chat with one another, share documents, and collaborate in real time. Subscribe to Office 365 for education plans online at https://education.office365.com, or by licensing through your Microsoft Reseller.

 

What accounts will users have when the upgrade completes?

After the upgrade completes, users will have two accounts:

  • A personal Microsoft account (formerly Windows Live ID) they can use to access SkyDrive, Messenger, and other Microsoft services, just as before with Live@edu
  • A new Office 365 account enabled for email with Exchange Online

The Office 365 account will require a new password after the upgrade. Tell your Live@edu users in advance of the upgrade how to create this new password at https://eduupgrade.office365.com/.
This site lets end users create their own Office 365 password rather than rely on your institution’s help desk to create one for them. Learn more about Password Management and read about the Live@edu Upgrade to Office 365 for education in the Upgrade Help.

 

What assistance is available to prepare your environment for the upgrade?

Qualified Microsoft partners are available to assist with your preparations for the upgrade - to plan and deploy any required updates to servers or clients,  like the Office 365 Directory Synchronization server or Forefront Identity Manager server to automate provisoning, or Active Directory Federated Services for federated authentication with the cloud.   Find a deployment partner and contact them for more information on how they can assist with your upgrade.

 

What do you need to do to get started today?

1. Start promoting the upgrade with customizable templates. Download the End User Kit.

2. Complete the tasks in the before-upgrade checklist.

3. Contact Live@edu support to start the upgrade to Office 365 for education.

 

October 18th update:    the Live@edu upgrade team has just launched a site that allows you to walk through a demo of the upgrade process.  Go to https://www.office365demolabs.com and sign in with your LiveID. 

Let us know in the comments what you think, and any other resources that would be helpful to you.