If you can figure out your college major and get that degree in 4 years, Microsoft is offering a way to keep you covered in Microsoft Office for the length of your studies.
On Tuesday, Microsoft rolled out a new offering called Office 365 University, allowing students of higher learning to enroll in its cloud-based Office suite for $79.99 for a four-year subscription that can be installed on two PCs or Macs. That puts an Office 365 subscription at close to $20 per year for two computers—a phenomenal price. The offer is actually available for not just students, but also faculty and staff, and includes Word, Excel, OneNote, PowerPoint, Outlook, Access, Publisher, Skype, and SkyDrive.
Of course, there are caveats to be eligible. The program is only available to "eligible students." Microsoft requires the following:
- Individual must be a full- or part-time enrolled university or college student or faculty or staff at an eligible accredited educational institution and must be able to provide proof of enrollment to Microsoft or its appointed vendor upon request. Alumni of these institutions are ineligible;
- Individual must successfully verify eligibility status through the Offer Site’s online academic verification process; and
- Individual must have a Microsoft account or create one at the time of purchase.
You can read more about Office 365 University and initiate your subscription at the online Microsoft Store here: Office 365 University
Office 365 University does not run on Windows XP or Windows Vista. It is only compatible with Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2, and Windows Server 2012. So, if you're thinking you can hold out using that old Windows XP computer, you can't. In fact, Windows XP expires in April 2014 and you should already be making plans to migrate to a newer Windows OS anyway.
