Microsoft is already pushing it out to select testers

Mar 24, 2012 15:01 GMT  ·  By

Redmond-based software giant Microsoft is reportedly gearing up for the release of a new Office for Education application as part of its SharePoint offering.

At the moment, the company is testing the application among a select group of users, a recent article from ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley shows.

Sources familiar with the matter have confirmed that the company is testing the application with people who are also testing the new Office 365 for Education SKUs.

This does not come too much as a surprise, since Microsoft already confirmed technical previews of Office 15, Office 15 server apps (Exchange 15, SharePoint 15 and Lync 15) and Office 365 apps for select testers.

Apparently, the new application is set to arrive on the market as part of Microsoft’s upcoming SharePoint Server 15 product.

The upcoming Office for Education 15 application was designed specifically to fit the needs of those educational users who are looking for means to manage, track and report on classroom activity.

The app was targeted at both faculty and students, and will deliver a great deal of collaboration capabilities.

Through it, users will find it easy to share documents, build websites for specific groups, and create repositories for the associated resources, Mary Jo Foley reports.

Users will be able to set docs in these repositories to be rights-protected. They will also be able to search and check these files within the app.

For the time being, there are no specific details available on the manner in which this new educational app could be integrated. It might arrive either as part of the SharePoint Server 15 offering, or as a separate SKU.

Microsoft is also working on making its Office 365 for Education globally available this summer as the successor to Live@Edu. Microsoft plans three pricing/licensing plans for it, namely A2, A3 and A4, the first of them being free for both students and faculty.