AI-powered teaching and learning for all Microsoft 365 education customers
Welcome to our monthly update for Microsoft Education and thank you so much for being part of our growing community! In our main Microsoft Education blog this morning, we announced the details of how Microsoft Education is bringing even more value to all EDU customers with Microsoft 365, including a new set of capabilities designed for relevant and powerful use by educators and students. These features will be included in all of the academic SKUs (A SKUs) at no additional cost, and many will be rolling out starting today, while others will be rolling out later this year and into early next year. Topics: AI for educators at no additional cost AI for learners at no additional cost Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat Microsoft 365 LTI (LMS integration updates) Microsoft 365 Copilot (add-on required) Learning Accelerator updates Learning Zone on the Copilot+ PC – public preview now available Minecraft EU updates We’re also introducing an academic offering for Microsoft 365 Copilot in education at $18 (USD) per user per month for educators, staff, and students ages 13 and older starting in December 2025. 1. AI for Educators at no additional cost Teach in the Microsoft 365 Copilot App We recently introduced the updated Microsoft 365 Copilot app, your hub for the latest AI functionality. Now, we are bringing AI-powered features to all educators with Teach in the Microsoft 365 Copilot app. In one place, educators can easily create lesson plans, draft materials like quizzes and rubrics, and quickly make modifications like adjust reading levels, differentiate instructions, and align to relevant standards. As we continue to add more AI value in education, it will surface in the Teach module. Teach is your one stop shop for creating and adapting education content in a guided interface, designed for Education institutions. Teaching capabilities can assist you in drafting the best content for your class, including lesson plans, rubrics, learning activities and more! Guided: Create and adapt content in guided interfaces, reducing the need for advanced prompting techniques, while still giving you full control. Grounded: Leverage Education standards from 35 countries, your own content, and your class details to ground and create content relevant to your class. Available where you are: In the Microsoft 365 Copilot App on Web, Windows or Mac. When: Rolling out now with support for Lesson Plans, Rubrics, and Flashcards. Coming Soon: Support for Quizzes, Minecraft Lessons, Fill in the Blank activities, and modifying existing content. Learn more about Teach in the Microsoft 365 Copilot App here. Curriculum planning Curriculum planning tools in Teach empowers educators to design, organize, and adapt instructional materials with ease. By leveraging AI-powered tools, teachers can create lesson plans, activities, and assessments that align with educational standards and meet the diverse needs of their students. Whether starting from scratch or refining existing resources, curriculum planning provides a guided, flexible approach to support effective teaching and learning. Lesson plans with standard support Easily build standards-aligned lesson plans from a selection of over 35 countries. Educators can choose subject, grade level, language, relevant content and context, standards, and duration to tailor each lesson plan to their classroom needs. The platform enables ongoing editing and refinement—adjust the tone, length, or language, and receive further suggestions to ensure every lesson plan is effective and engaging. When: Lesson plans rolling out now Homework & Assessments Homework & Assessments tools in Teach help streamline homework and assessment creation for educators. With Rubrics and Quiz creation, teachers can easily build standards-aligned rubrics and quizzes, customize criteria and questions, and refine content to fit classroom needs. These tools support ongoing editing and suggestions, helping educators deliver clear, effective assessments that align with learning goals and standards. Rubrics with standards support Effortlessly create rubrics aligned to global standards from over 35 countries. Educators can select relevant criteria, customize performance levels, and ensure each rubric matches their subject, grade, and instructional goals. The platform supports ongoing editing—adjust the language, tone, or detail, and receive further suggestions to refine your rubric for clarity and effectiveness. Standards integration helps educators provide consistent, high-quality feedback and assessment for every student. When: Rubrics rolling out now Quiz creation with standards Create standards-aligned quizzes quickly with Quiz creation, powered by Forms. Start by selecting your subject, grade level, language, and relevant standards. Add a description, set the desired number of questions and quiz duration, and generate a draft. All editing and adjustments are done directly in Forms, where you can refine questions and further tailor the quiz to your students’ needs. When: Preview in November, 2025 Modify content Modify content tools are designed to help educators quickly adapt existing materials, rather than create new content from scratch. Whether you have resources from previous years, colleagues, or online sources, this feature streamlines the process of updating and customizing materials for your current needs. Align to standards Align to standards takes your input—whether it’s a lesson idea, instructions, or other classroom materials—and adapts the content to align with the standards you choose. This tool streamlines the process of meeting curriculum requirements by automatically tweaking your materials, ensuring they match the specific standards relevant to your subject and grade level. When: Preview in November, 2025 Modify reading level Quickly adjust the reading level of any text to meet the needs of individual students or your entire class. Simply insert your text or upload a file, then choose the desired reading level. You can also select key terms to preserve, ensuring important vocabulary remains unchanged while the rest of the content is adapted for accessibility and understanding. When: Preview in November, 2025 Differentiate instructions Differentiate instructions empowers educators to tailor learning experiences for diverse student needs. Easily adapt assignments, instructions, or activities to provide multiple pathways for understanding and engagement. Whether you’re supporting individual learners or groups, this tool helps you modify content, adjust complexity, and personalize directions—ensuring every student receives the right level of challenge and support. When: Preview in November, 2025 Expand with examples Enrich your materials by adding a chosen number of real world, historical, or scientific examples—tailored to support and clarify learning for every student. When: Preview in November, 2025 AI in Classwork and Class Notebook AI teaching tools are also coming to Classwork in Microsoft Teams and OneNote Class Notebook, providing easy ways to create content and share with students all in one place. Starting with lesson plans and flashcards in Teams today, and other features from Teach coming later to Teams and Class Notebook. When: Lesson plans and flashcards available now in Classwork and coming soon to OneNote Class Notebook. Suggested AI feedback for Educators Suggested AI feedback is a new feature that makes it easier for you when you want to provide feedback to students as part of your Assignments flow. Use the Feedback field as a scratchpad as you review the student work, and have AI help enhance and summarize it for you. Or, if you are using rubrics, you can have AI review your rubric selection and summarize it. This feature always uses your input as the basis of the suggested summarized feedback, and you will always need to confirm the suggested update and add potential edits, before returning to the student. When: Available now Set expected AI use in Assignments Set expected AI use in Assignments helps educators clearly communicate guidelines and recommendations for how students should use AI tools when completing assignments. Teachers can outline best practices and expectations, helping students understand appropriate and effective ways to leverage AI in their work. This feature encourages thoughtful, responsible use of AI to support learning. When: Preview Q1 2026 2. AI for learners at no additional cost Study and Learn Agent Bring the interactive, conversational Study and Learn Agent in the Microsoft 365 Copilot App to your students. Study and Learn helps learners understand concepts, practice skills with activities like flashcards, and prepare for tests with study guides and quizzes. Additional activities including fill-in-the-blanks, matching, and others that will continue to be added. Purpose-built for learning in collaboration with learning science experts, Study and Learn aims to help foster reflective and critical thinking. Over time, it will provide a more personalized, adaptive, inclusive experience to make learning relevant and bolster motivation. When: Preview fall 2025 Learning activities We’re excited to share that Learning Activities are now generally available for all educators and students 13+! Learning activities is a new Microsoft Education experience designed to help educators and students transform passive content into active learning. With just a few clicks, educators and students can now create engaging practice activities like flashcards directly from existing learning content. Our first learning activity will be AI generated flashcards in Teach and Classwork. We will also be launching a stand-alone web app for educators and students to create activities. We are hard at work building more learning activities that will be coming soon including fill-in-the-blanks, mind maps, and matching. When: Summer 2025 3. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat Available for students 13+ Recently, we announced teen student availability coming this summer for Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot and now it is at general availability. To prepare, administrators should review guidance to enable Copilot Chat for students and ensure appropriate access: Enable Copilot Chat access for students Copilot Chat is included with Microsoft 365 at no additional cost and offers secure AI chat powered by GPT-5 with the ability to maintain IT control through enterprise data protection and management. It also includes features like file upload, image generation, Copilot Pages, and agents. Copilot Chat now in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote In addition, Microsoft recently announced that Copilot Chat is available in many of your favorite Office apps such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote and Outlook. This is available today for all Microsoft 365 subscribers in Education. 4. Create with AI in Microsoft365 LTI® for Learning Management Systems A new, streamlined learning management system experience for Microsoft Education The new Microsoft 365 LTI brings Microsoft 365 for Education capabilities for learning management systems (like Canvas, PowerSchool Schoology, Blackboard, Moodle, D2L Brightspace) together into a single tool and streamlined user experience. Educators will be able to Create with AI, which makes features from Teach accessible in Learning Management Systems. This will include Lesson plans, Minecraft lessons, modifying content, rubric and instructions generation, suggested feedback, quiz creation, and more. Microsoft 365 LTI also provides seamless access to Learning Accelerators, Reflect, OneDrive, Teams, and our Microsoft 365 for Education tools directly into your LMS course, without having to deploy multiple tools, and without overcrowding the menus where LTI tools are accessed. Whether adding content to a course, creating an assignment, or scheduling an online meeting for a class, you can easily access Microsoft 365 directly in your LMS workflow. When: Create with AI – preview in early 2026 LTI® is a trademark of the 1EdTech® Consortium, Inc. (1edtech.org) 5. Microsoft 365 Copilot (add-on required) We’re excited to introduce an academic offering for Microsoft 365 Copilot in education at $18 (USD) per user per month for educators, staff, and students ages 13 and older starting in December 2025. Deeply integrated into apps used every day, Microsoft 365 Copilot combines the power of AI with your data – documents, presentations, emails, meetings, chats, institutional knowledge, and more – plus the web to deliver relevant responses with sources. It also delivers cutting-edge capabilities like comprehensive agent access including Researcher and Analyst, Copilot Tuning for increased customization, and the Copilot Control System to protect institutional data. Study guide in Copilot Notebooks Copilot Notebooks in Microsoft 365 Copilot is your AI-powered workspace to stay focused on what matters most. Bring together Copilot chats, Microsoft 365 files, OneNote pages, meeting notes, and links—all in one place. Listen to an audio overview hosted by two voices. Ask questions and Copilot will analyze your notebook content, surface insights, and help you draft new content. Copilot Notebooks available now at microsoft365.com/copilot. (A Microsoft 365 Copilot license is required.) Coming to preview in Fall 2025, the new study guide feature will help learners turn scattered materials into an organized study space. Upload notes, lecture slides, handouts, and links to generate a custom guide with engaging activities, quizzes, and topic deep dives. Summary and topic pages include explanations, worked examples, and questions that help learners understand, think and apply their learning. With flashcards, quizes, and fill-in-the-blanks, learning becomes active and personalized – for college, K-12, and adults learners alike. Copilot Notebooks are available inside OneNote alongside all the rest of your classic Notebooks to keep everything together and easy to find. When: Copilot Notebooks available now, Study Guide preview November 2025 6. Learning Accelerator updates AI Transcript Feedback in Speaker Progress is now GA! We are excited to share our new narrative AI feedback feature in Speaker Progress is now fully rolled out to all users! We are bringing generative AI to Speaker Progress to give students robust feedback on their speeches. Educators can choose to enable AI feedback, select a speech type, and evaluation criteria. Student speeches will then receive summary feedback and in line comments to help them improve the content and qualitative aspects of their presentations. The educator is fully in control and must review AI Feedback before it is shared with students. When: Available Now! 7. Microsoft Learning Zone enters public preview Earlier this year, we introduced Microsoft Learning Zone, a new app built for Copilot+ PCs to help educators create interactive, personalized lessons in minutes. Now available in public preview, the app combines research-informed tools and trusted on-device AI to help educators save time, engage students, and keep content and data secure. We are grateful to the educators, researchers, and partners who have helped shape the experience so far. In the months ahead, we will continue to expand Learning Zone with new features, rich content partnerships, and deeper integration into classroom workflows. When: Learning Zone is now in public preview. If your school is planning to explore Learning Zone, please note that an IT administrator must enable the app before it can be used. View instructions here. 8. Minecraft Education’s AI Foundations curriculum Crack the case of AI misuse as a rookie detective Join Detective Reed Smart to investigate curious cases of AI misuse in this mystery from Minecraft Education! Analyze deepfakes, spot AI-generated content, and learn how AI works as you follow clues and analyze evidence across three cases. Build AI and information literacy skills that will help you get wise and stay cautious of online information. Ready to crack the case? Full video here: https://www.youtube.com/embed/_JuQXY6UZ2Q?si=fvHbLiX3nLcOE5mA Join this hands-on training designed to empower educators to teach AI literacy using Minecraft Education’s AI Foundations curriculum and Microsoft Copilot. Through interactive demos and ready-to-use resources, you’ll explore how to make AI concepts engaging and accessible for students—no prior experience with AI or Minecraft required! Minecraft Education Crack the case of AI misuse as a rookie detective ________ And finally, just to recap all the news we have for you this month, here’s a quick review of all the features that are generally available or are rolling out now: AI for educators at no additional cost Teach in the Microsoft 365 Copilot App Classwork integration AI Feedback Standards integration Learning Activities AI for learners at no additional cost Study and Learn Agent Learning Activities Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat Now available for teens (13+) Now available in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and OneNote Microsoft 365 LTI (LMS integration updates) Create with AI Microsoft 365 Copilot (add-on required) Study guide in Copilot Notebooks Learning Accelerator updates Speaker Progress Narrative AI feedback Learning Zone on the Copilot+ PC – public preview now available Minecraft Education's AI Fundations Curriculum Mike Tholfsen Group Product Manager Microsoft EducationWhat's New in Microsoft EDU - October 2025 (AI for all edition)
Join us on Wednesday, October 22nd, 2025 for our latest "What's New in Microsoft EDU" webinar! This will be a special one where we go into depth about all of the AI powered tools for educators and students who use Microsoft 365 in Education that we just announced. These 30-minute webinars are put on by the Microsoft Education Product Management group and happen once per month, this month both 8:00am Pacific Time and 4:00pm Pacific time to cover as many global time zones as possible around the world. And don’t worry – we’ll be recording these and posting on our Microsoft Education YouTube channel in the new “What’s New in Microsoft EDU” playlist, so you’ll always to able to watch later or share with others! Here is our October 2025 webinar agenda: M365 Copilot and AI updates for Educators and Students Learning Zone public preview and the Copilot+ PC Microsoft 365 LTI for Learning Management Systems AMA - Ask Microsoft EDU Anything (Q&A) We look forward to having you attend the event! How to sign up OPTION 1: October 22nd, Wednesday @ 8:00am Pacific Time Register here OPTION 2: October 22nd, Wednesday @ 4:00pm Pacific Time Register here This is what the webinar portal will look like when you register: We look forward to seeing you there! Mike Tholfsen Group Product Manager Microsoft EducationMicrosoft 365 LTI is now Generally Available
Today, Microsoft is announcing a unified LTI® designed to make LMS integrations simple, with powerful capabilities to streamline and simplify deployment. Microsoft 365 LTI enhances your LMS platform whether you’re using Canvas, Schoology, Brightspace, Blackboard, Moodle™, or any other LTI 1.3 capable platform, making it easier than ever for educators and students to leverage the full suite of Microsoft 365 tools within their existing LMS workflows. The new Microsoft 365 LTI combines all the capabilities of the individual tools into one convenient tool--instead of managing multiple LTI integrations, you’ll have one unified solution that is more functional and easier to deploy and maintain. Educators and learners will benefit from a more seamless and up-to-date LMS experience for Microsoft 365 Education. Teach and learn with confidence knowing that Microsoft 365 LTI is backed by Microsoft's industry-leading security and compliance tools with Microsoft 365. Deploy and access the new Microsoft 365 LTI in your LMS with the overview and deployment guides. IMPORTANT: If you've already deployed the Microsoft 365 LTI in preview, you do not need to redeploy in your LMS – However there are a few action items for LMS admins with existing deployments: Review the deployment guide for any updates Revisit your Admin Settings, to review the apps enabled you wish your educators to have access to in their courses Ask your M365 Admin to re-consent to permissions to grant the app additional permission to display Meeting Recordings with the M365 Consent link Microsoft 365 LTI release debuts with OneNote Cass Notebook, Teams, Meetings and Reflect – all generally available. Microsoft Assignments, OneDrive, and Reading Coach join these experiences in preview and will transition to GA as ready. At-a-glance: The Microsoft 365 LTI is now generally available, bringing all your favorite Microsoft Education tools into a single, seamless experience inside your LMS. No more juggling multiple integrations - just streamlined access to everything educators and students need, right where they work. This includes: Unified access to OneDrive, Teams, Class Notebook, Reflect, and more, directly in your LMS Add content, create assignments, and schedule meetings - all from one place New – Reading Coach bringing reading self-practice for students to your LMS No need to enable multiple tools separately or clutter your LMS menus Available for all currently supported LMS platforms, including Canvas by Instructure, PowerSchool Schoology Learning, Blackboard by Anthology, D2L/Brightspace, and Moodle™, and for any LTI 1.3 Advantage compliant platform. Existing LTI retirements: Replaces deprecated Teams Meetings and Team Classes LTI tools sunsetting September 15, 2025 Replaces Microsoft OneDrive LTI, OneNote LTI, Teams Assignments LTI and Reflect LTI as they retire next September 17, 2026 Dive into the new Microsoft 365 LTI to streamline your LMS experience We are bringing our Microsoft 365 Education capabilities for learning management systems together into a single, unified tool to streamline the user experience. Educators will be able to access Learning Accelerators, Reflect, OneDrive, Teams, and more in their LMS courses, without having to enable multiple tools separately, and without overcrowding menus where LTI tools surface. Whether adding content to a module, creating an assignment, or scheduling a meeting for a class, you will be able to easily access Microsoft 365 Education related features directly in your LMS workflow. Microsoft 365 LTI is available for supported LMS platforms, including Canvas by Instructure, PowerSchool Schoology Learning, Blackboard by Anthology, D2L/Brightspace, and Moodle™, and for any LTI 1.3 Advantage compliant platform. Learning Accelerators and AI-enhanced assignments in your LMS - without Microsoft Teams (Preview) With the Microsoft 365 LTI, you will be able to use Learning Accelerators, multiple-document submissions, AI rubric and instructions generation, AI-assisted feedback, auto-graded Forms and other Microsoft Education assignment capabilities directly within your learning management system (LMS), without the need to create and sync a Microsoft Team for your class. Assignments in Microsoft 365 LTI no longer require Teams, enabling more LMS users to benefit from advanced, AI-enhanced capabilities that were formerly exclusive to Microsoft Teams for Education. Assignments can be created, managed, completed, and graded, without leaving your LMS, and grades and feedback will sync automatically to the LMS gradebook. This capability is included automatically in the new Microsoft 365 LTI tool. Existing, Teams-based assignments will continue to work and can be copied to new courses, so no migration is necessary. The assignments functionality in Microsoft 365 LTI replaces the classic Teams Assignments LTI which will retire next September 17, 2026. NEW! - Introducing Reading Coach in your LMS (Preview) Support independent reading with confidence. The Reading Coach student experience is now available in your LMS—offering students personalized reading practice, real-time feedback on fluency and pronunciation, with engaging AI-generated stories, library passages, and the option to add their own content to keep practice fun and fresh. Available now in preview. Teams and Teams Meetings Microsoft 365 LTI replaces the former Teams Classes LTI and Teams Meetings LTI tools which reach end of life on September 15, 2025. The new Teams and Teams Meetings experiences continue in Microsoft 365 LTI with improved user experiences where users can easily schedule, manage, and launch meetings from directly within their LMS course. The tool provides streamlined views of future and past meetings, attendance insights, and a “Meet Now” capability. NEW! view all of your meeting recordings on one place in the Recordings and files tab! Automatic rostering in Class Notebooks returns with the Microsoft 365 LTI In March, we announced the retirement of automatically adding newly rostered students and co-educators to OneNote Class Notebooks provisioned through the LMS using the LTI 1.1 integration. This much-loved feature is back in the new Class Notebook app in Microsoft 365 LTI. Any instructor in the LMS course can create a Class Notebook and all co-educators and students are automatically added to the notebook--even as the LMS roster changes. In addition, the new integration enables OneNote with the benefits of LTI 1.3 conformance and a modernized provisioning flow for educators to easily deploy new Class Notebooks for their courses. Existing notebooks created in the LTI 1.1 integration will continue to work, and sections and pages can be easily copied to new notebooks. The OneNote Class Notebook app in Microsoft 365 LTI replaces the classic OneNote LTI which will retire next September 17, 2026. OneDrive and Microsoft 365 files with embedded editors and new placements (Preview) The new Microsoft 365 LTI tool expands beyond the capabilities of the existing OneDrive LTI tool. The full capabilities of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel, including Microsoft 365 Copilot, are now available within the LMS experience for attaching content resources, collaborative documents (including Collaborations for Canvas Courses and Groups), and students editing and submitting Microsoft 365 documents as an assignment without leaving the LMS. Documents can be embedded or linked into courses and other LMS activities including discussions, announcements, pages, with proper management of permissions to prevent oversharing, and with dedicated course-level storage to support proper document lifecycle management, assignment workflows, and use of Microsoft 365 Copilot. This functionality replaces the classic Microsoft OneDrive LTI which will retire September 17, 2026. Easily add Reflect to your classroom Microsoft 365 LTI also provides easy access to Microsoft Reflect to support student wellbeing in the classroom. Educators can create check-ins, view responses, and monitor trends within an LMS course. Users can access activities from Microsoft and partners such as Calm to support physical and mental wellbeing. The Reflect app in Microsoft 365 LTI replaces the classic Reflect LTI which will retire next September 17, 2026. For more information, and to keep up with future product announcements Please visit the Microsoft Tech Community Education Blog and subscribe to keep up with what’s new in Microsoft Education. We also hold bi-monthly office hours every first and third Thursday where lots of LMS + Microsoft 365 customers come to discuss scenarios and get assistance from peers, please join us. Microsoft 365 LTI Office Hours 1 st and 3 rd Thursday of each month @11am EST Join link: https://aka.ms/LTIOfficeHours How to get help or send feedback For any issues deploying the integration, our Education Support team is here to help. Please visit https://aka.ms/EduSupport Once deployed, the Microsoft 365 LTI integration has links to Contact Support and Send Feedback from right within the app. These can be found in the user voice menu in the upper right on any view that appears within the LMS. Learn more about Microsoft feedback for your organization. We can’t wait to hear your feedback! Try out the Microsoft 365 LTI today! Learning Tools Interoperability® (LTI®) is a trademark of the 1EdTech Consortium, Inc. (1edtech.org) The word Moodle and associated Moodle logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Moodle Pty Ltd or its related affiliates.What's new in OneNote for EDU - Back to School 2025
It’s back-to-school time, and OneNote EDU is rolling out fresh updates to make life easier for educators and students alike! In this article, we’ll cover the latest OneNote features and updates for education, including: Built-in Class Notebook toolbar in OneNote on Windows and for Mac (no more need to download the add-in!) – How to enable it and why it’s great New Microsoft 365 LTI 1.3 integration – Streamlined LMS access to Class Notebook, Assignments, Reflect, and more Broader OneNote updates – Merge table cells (finally!) and a new option to “paste text only” Education Insiders Program (EIP) – How to join and help shape the future of Class Notebook Let’s dive in and get you ready for an amazing school year with OneNote! 1. Enable the Class Notebook Toolbar natively in OneNote on Windows and for Mac Class Notebook features are now built directly into OneNote on desktop – no separate add-in required! This means if you’re using OneNote on Windows or for Mac, you already have the Class Notebook tools; you just might need to turn them on. Enabling the native toolbar gives you all the goodies (page distribution, review student work, etc.) right on the ribbon while ensuring you always have the latest updates and better performance than the old add-in. Why this matters: A built-in toolbar means one less installation to worry about and more reliable updates. Schools no longer need to deploy the legacy add-in for Class Notebook on each device. It’s simpler for IT and ensures every teacher has the Class Notebook tools by default. How to enable the Class Notebook toolbar: In OneNote for Windows (Microsoft 365), click File > Options > General. Under Class Notebook, check the box for “Enable Class Notebook” and select OK. The Class Notebook tab will appear on your OneNote ribbon, loaded with all the Class Notebook features you know and love. (Tip: If you previously installed the add-in, you might see two Class Notebook tabs. You can remove the old add-in to avoid confusion.) For more details, check out the Enable the Class Notebook Toolbar in OneNote Desktop support article. 2. New Microsoft 365 LTI 1.3 Integration for LMS The new Microsoft 365 LTI app brings OneNote Class Notebook along with other Microsoft 365 Education experiences like Microsoft Assignments, OneDrive/Microsoft 365 files, Teams for collaboration, Teams Meetings and more to your learning management system (LMS). It is compatible with any LTI 1.3 Advantage Platform, and setup instructions can be found here: https://aka.ms/LMSAdminDocs. Key benefits of the new M365 LTI integration: All-in-one access: Once your LMS admin installs the Microsoft 365 LTI, educators and students get one-click access to OneNote Class Notebook, assignments, OneDrive, Teams meetings, Reflect check-ins and more – right from your LMS course. No more juggling separate LTI apps for each tool. Automatic roster sync: Class Notebook now supports auto-rostering with LTI 1.3. When you create a Class Notebook through the LMS, all learners and educators in that course are automatically added to the notebook as students and teachers/co-teachers respectively (and will be added automatically if they join later). This beloved feature, previously in older LTI integration, is back – saving you setup time. Assignments and grades in your LMS: Using the new LTI, you can create Microsoft Assignments (with Learning Accelerator tools like Reading Progress, etc.) directly in your LMS. Students submit without leaving the LMS, and grades sync back to the LMS gradebook. It brings the power of Teams Assignments into the LMS environment, no Teams class needed. Streamlined and up-to-date: The Microsoft 365 LTI replaces several legacy LTI tools (like the old “Teams Classes LTI” and separate OneNote LTI 1.1 app). This reduces confusion and upkeep. Getting started with the new LTI is simple for IT admins, with full documentation here. If you’re an educator, check with your IT about enabling the Microsoft 365 LTI for your courses. 3. Broader OneNote updates: merge table cells and paste text only The OneNote team has been hard at work on core improvements that benefit both educators and students. Here are two notable updates rolling out: Merge table cells in OneNote on Windows and for Mac: You asked, and it’s finally here – the ability to merge cells in a table. This means you can take any adjacent cells (horizontal or vertical) in a OneNote table and combine them into one cell (just like in Word or Excel). Paste text only in OneNote on Windows, for Mac, and for the web: Ever copy-paste some text into OneNote only to have it bring in crazy fonts or colors from a website or another document? We hear you – and now in OneNote you can use the familiar shortcut Ctrl + Shift + V (Windows) or Cmd + Shift + V (Mac) to paste plain text, stripping out all the source formatting. The pasted content will match your current notebook’s font style. This also works via the right-click menu: choose Paste > Keep Text Only. It’s a small quality-of-life change that can save a ton of cleanup time, especially when gathering materials from various sources into your lesson plans or content library. Read more about this here: Paste text only in OneNote on Windows, for Mac, and for the web All these updates are either available now or rolling out to OneNote users: Merge table cells is currently in preview for Office Insiders (as of late July 2025) and will reach all OneNote desktop clients in the coming updates. Paste Text Only is rolling out to OneNote for the web users and OneNote users running the most recent versions on Windows and on Mac. Features are released over some time to ensure things are working smoothly, so don’t worry if you can’t see it quite yet. 4. Join the Education Insiders Program (EIP) Lastly, a call to action for passionate educators: if you love getting early access to new features or want to provide direct feedback to the OneNote and Class Notebook team, consider joining the Education Insiders Program (EIP). This is a free community for K-12 and higher-ed tech leaders, teachers, and IT administrators who use Microsoft tools. As an Education Insider, you can: Preview and influence new features: Get invites to try out early builds or pilot programs (with your school’s Office 365 tenant) and share feedback before features launch worldwide. For example, insiders often get to test things like the latest Class Notebook updates and provide input. Participate in the Class Notebook insiders channel: There’s a dedicated Class Notebook discussion space where you can discuss ideas, ask questions, and interact with Microsoft product managers and other educators. It’s a direct line to share what you’d love to see in OneNote. Sound interesting? Sign up for EIP via this form. Once accepted, you’ll be plugged into the insider community, including the Class Notebook channel where you can weigh in on the future of OneNote. (By joining EIP, you’ll help shape products like OneNote – many of the features in this blog (such as merged table cells and the new LTI integration) were influenced by feedback from educators. We’d love to have your voice in the mix!) We hope these updates get you excited for back to school with OneNote. Whether you’re empowering students with more organized Class Notebooks, integrating OneNote more seamlessly into your LMS, or just enjoying a smoother note-taking experience, there’s a lot to look forward to this year. Try out these new features in your classroom workflow, and let us know what you think. You can drop your thoughts in the comments or join the conversation in the Education Insiders community. Here’s to a successful and innovative school year ahead with OneNote! 💜 Which new OneNote EDU feature are you most excited about? Let us know in the comments, and have a fantastic start to the school year!Preview the new Microsoft 365 LTI® for your LMS
Enhance your LMS with the power of Microsoft 365 We are excited to announce the public preview of Microsoft 365 LTI. Experience the full potential of Microsoft 365 directly within your Learning Management System (LMS) through a simple to integrate learning tool interoperability (LTI). Microsoft 365 LTI makes LMS integrations simple, with a powerful tool designed to introduce new capabilities to streamline and simplify deployment. Deploy and access the new Microsoft 365 LTI in your LMS with the overview and deployment guides. At-a-glance: The Microsoft 365 LTI is now in Public Preview, bringing all your favorite Microsoft Education tools into a single, seamless experience inside your LMS. No more juggling multiple integrations - just streamlined access to everything educators and students need, right where they work. This includes: Unified access to OneDrive, Teams, Class Notebook, Reflect, and more, directly in your LMS Add content, create assignments, and schedule meetings - all from one place No need to enable multiple tools separately or clutter your LMS menus Replaces deprecated Teams Meetings and Team Classes LTI tools Expanding support for Microsoft Assignments, OneDrive, OneNote Class Notebooks, and Reflect Available for Canvas, Schoology, Blackboard, D2L Brightspace, Moodle, and more Let’s dive into the new Microsoft 365 LTI to streamline your learning management system experience We are bringing our Microsoft Education capabilities for learning management systems together into a single tool and streamlined user experience. Educators will be able to access Learning Accelerators, Reflect, OneDrive, Teams, and more in their LMS courses, without having to enable multiple tools separately, and without overcrowding menus where LTI tools are surfaced. Whether adding content to a module, creating an assignment, or scheduling a meeting for a class, you will be able to easily access Microsoft Education related features directly in your LMS workflow. Microsoft 365 LTI debuts with replacements for the deprecated Teams Meetings and Team Classes LTI tools that sunset on 9/15/2025. The capabilities of Microsoft Assignments, OneDrive, OneNote Class Notebooks, and Reflect will also be added to the Microsoft 365 LTI in preview, and those existing LTIs will continue to be supported as their capabilities transition. Microsoft 365 LTI will be available for all currently supported LMS platforms, including Canvas by Instructure, PowerSchool Schoology Learning, Blackboard by Anthology, D2L/Brightspace, and Moodle™, and for any LTI 1.3 Advantage compliant platform. Learning Accelerators and AI-enhanced assignments in your LMS (without Microsoft Teams) With the Microsoft 365 LTI, you will be able to use Learning Accelerators, multiple-document submissions, AI rubric and instructions generation, AI-assisted feedback, auto-graded Forms and other Microsoft Education assignment capabilities directly within your learning management system (LMS), without the need to create and sync a Microsoft Team for your class. Assignments in Microsoft 365 LTI no longer require Teams, enabling more LMS users to benefit from advanced, AI-enhanced capabilities that were formerly exclusive to Microsoft Teams for Education. Assignments can be created, managed, completed, and graded, without leaving your LMS, and grades and feedback will sync automatically to the LMS gradebook. This capability is included automatically in the new Microsoft 365 LTI tool. Existing, Teams-based assignments will continue to work and can be copied to new courses, so no migration is necessary. This enhancement will apply to all currently supported LMS platforms, including Canvas, Schoology, Blackboard, D2L Brightspace, and Moodle. Teams and Teams Meetings Microsoft 365 LTI replaces the former Teams Classes LTI and Teams Meetings LTI tools, with improved user experience. Users can easily schedule, manage, and launch meetings from directly within their LMS course. The tool provides streamlined views of future and past meetings, consolidated attendance reports, and a new “Meet Now” capability. Automatic rostering in Class Notebooks returns with the Microsoft 365 LTI In March, we announced the retirement of automatically adding newly rostered students and co-educators to OneNote Class Notebooks provisioned through the LMS using the LTI 1.1 integration. This much-loved feature is back in the new Class Notebook app in Microsoft 365 LTI. Any instructor in the LMS course can create a Class Notebook and all co-educators and students automatically added to the notebook, even as the LMS roster changes. In addition, the new integration enables OneNote with the benefits of LTI 1.3 conformance and a modernized provisioning flow for educators to easily deploy new Class Notebooks for their courses. Existing notebooks created in the LTI 1.1 integration will continue to work, and sections and pages can be easily copied to new notebooks. OneDrive and Microsoft 365 files with embedded editors and new placements The new Microsoft 365 LTI tool expands beyond the capabilities of the existing OneDrive LTI tool. The full capabilities of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel, including Microsoft 365 Copilot, are now available within the LMS experience for attaching content resources, collaborative documents (including Collaborations for Canvas Courses and Groups!), and students editing and submitting Microsoft 365 documents as an assignment without leaving the LMS. Documents can be embedded or linked into courses and other LMS activities like discussions, announcements, pages, with proper management of permissions to prevent oversharing, and with dedicated course-level storage to support proper document lifecycle management, assignment workflows, and use of Microsoft 365 Copilot. Easily add Reflect to your classroom toolset Microsoft 365 LTI provides easy access to Microsoft Reflect to support student wellbeing in the classroom. Educators can create check-ins, view responses, and monitor trends within an LMS course. Users can access activities from Microsoft and partners such as Calm to support physical and mental wellbeing. For more information, and to keep up with future product announcements Please visit the Microsoft Tech Community Education Blog and subscribe to keep up with what’s new in Microsoft Education. We also hold bi-monthly office hours every first and third Thursday where lots of LMS + Microsoft 365 customers come to discuss scenarios and get assistance from peers, please join us! Microsoft 365 LTI Office Hours 1 st and 3 rd Thursday of each month @11am EST Join link: https://aka.ms/LTIOfficeHours We can’t wait to hear your feedback! Try out the preview today. How to get help or send feedback For any issues deploying the integration, our Education Support team is here to help. Please visit https://aka.ms/EduSupport Once deployed, the Teams Assignments integration has links to Contact Support and Send Feedback from right within the app. These can be found in the user voice menu in the upper right on any view that appears within the LMS. Learn more about Microsoft feedback for your organization. Learning Tools Interoperability® (LTI®) is a trademark of the 1EdTech Consortium, Inc. (1edtech.org) The word Moodle and associated Moodle logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Moodle Pty Ltd or its related affiliates.Empowering Learners for the Age of AI: New Information Literacy Features Coming to Search Progress
Hello educators! We’re excited to announce upcoming enhancements to Search Progress — a Learning Accelerator available through Assignments in Teams for Education and the recently announced Microsoft 365 LTI app (compatible with most major LMS systems). These enhancements are designed to help students navigate today’s complex information ecosystem with confidence. Why This Matters Information literacy skills like verifying sources, understanding context, and thinking critically are foundational for responsible and effective navigation of online information. These skills become even more critical as AI becomes an integral part of learning and daily life -- students need more than just access to information, they need to know how to evaluate it. By strengthening these skills, we help students become thoughtful, independent researchers, and savvy digital citizens. To ensure these features were developed in alignment with the latest in online reasoning research, Microsoft consulted with experts from the Digital Inquiry Group — a team with decades of experience as curriculum designers, classroom educators, researchers, and teacher educators — that has been recognized with awards from UNESCO, the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, the American Educational Research Association, and the School Library Association, to name a few. What’s New? Launching in preview in the coming months, the enhanced Search Progress features will allow educators to scaffold the research process (and perhaps pick up some new skills themselves), breaking down complex information evaluation into core skills such as: Connecting information to its source: recognizing that every piece of information comes from somewhere and is created for a reason, and to consider the author of the information and why they wrote it Evaluating source reputability: looking into the individuals or organizations behind resources and determining what other sources say about them, rather than relying solely on what the source says about itself (analogous to how employers use references in the job interview process) Impact awareness: considering what could be at risk if the information is inaccurate or fabricated (for example: information claiming to be health/wellness or financial advice might be greater risk to the reader than an AI-generated image of a cat dancing at the disco) Cross-checking and lateral reading: “using the internet to check the internet” — comparing information and perspectives across multiple sources to reveal patterns, differences, and possible inaccuracies Metacognitive awareness: reflecting on the research process each step of the way, including why certain sources stood out, which search strategies worked best, and how to apply these learnings in the future These enhancements introduce more intentional cognitive forcing functions — structured activities and checkpoints to encourage students to pause, consider, and articulate their reasoning as they navigate the complex world of online information. By emphasizing process over product, this approach centers student voices as they reflect on their choices and document their reasoning — making their thinking visible and learning journey clear to educators. Importantly, these Search Progress enhancements aren’t just for formal research projects: they’re designed for any assignment or class activity that involves online research. Whether students are exploring a new topic, gathering sources for a presentation, or verifying information for a discussion, Search Progress aims to help them build habits that will transfer easily throughout the digital information ecosystem — from more wisely navigating social media to more thoughtfully using AI tools. Information literacy as a future-ready skill As global initiatives like the PISA 2029 Media and Artificial Intelligence Literacy (MAIL) assessment start to take shape, schools will be expected to demonstrate that students have had meaningful opportunities to learn about and engage critically with digital content. By integrating tools like Search Progress across various assignments and class activities, educators can ensure that students are better prepared for such assessments, and more importantly, for lifelong success navigating online and AI-generated information. Get Involved Educators can sign up for updates and early access to the preview product enhancements and new tools, with additional opportunities to join community calls and share feedback directly with Microsoft’s product team. Join the Search Progress channel in the Education Insiders Program (EIP) team to learn more, and if you’re not yet an EIP member, sign up here: aka.ms/JoinEIP. Microsoft is committed to helping you foster information and AI literacy, empowering students to succeed in an AI-driven world. Thank you for being part of the Microsoft Education community, and to all those who have shared feedback so far to help us bring these enhancements to life! 🔍✨What's New in Microsoft EDU - Back to School August 2025
Welcome to our monthly update for Microsoft Education and thank you so much for being part of our growing community! Topics: Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat for teens (13-17) Microsoft 365 LTI (LMS integration updates) Learning Zone on the Copilot+ PC – public preview now available Microsoft 365 Copilot – Educator Features Microsoft 365 Copilot – Learner Features Learning Accelerators Updates OneNote EDU Updates We’ve loved seeing the early impact at schools and institutions such as Brisbane Catholic Education and Miami Dade College and the exploration of new capabilities like agents. Get started with Copilot Chat, our no-cost AI-powered chat with data protection, and learn more about Microsoft 365 Copilot. Our first two topics today are about even more value -- we’re bringing even more value to education in with Microsoft 365 Copilot, including with a new set of capabilities designed for relevant and powerful use by educators and students. These features will be included in Microsoft 365 Copilot and will be in private previews over the coming months. Education organizations institutions with any academic license are eligible to purchase Microsoft 365 Copilot, with no minimum, for their faculty, staff, and students aged 13 and older. Our second topic brings a powerful LMS integration for AI-powered learning tools, with Microsoft 365 LTI. 1. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat for teens (13+) Last month, we announced teen student availability coming this summer for Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot and today, we are sharing general availability is expected in late July, 2025. To prepare, administrators should review guidance to enable Copilot Chat for students and ensure appropriate access. Enable Copilot Chat access for students Copilot Chat is included with Microsoft 365 at no additional cost and offers secure AI chat powered by GPT-4o with the ability to maintain IT control through enterprise data protection and management. It also includes features like file upload, image generation, Copilot Pages, and agents. We’re optimistic about the opportunities that lie ahead to help students increase their agency and build skills to prepare for future success. Read more about use cases, reflections, and advice from our global private preview educators and students in the announcement blog and from Johns Creek High School in the following video. When: Available now! 2. Introducing Microsoft 365 LTI® A new, streamlined learning management system experience for Microsoft Education Microsoft 365 LTI brings Microsoft 365 for Education capabilities for learning management systems together into a single tool and streamlined user experience. Microsoft 365 LTI provides seamless access to Learning Accelerators, Reflect, OneDrive, Teams, and our Microsoft 365 for Education tools directly into your LMS course, without having to deploy multiple tools, and without overcrowding the menus where LTI tools are accessed. Whether adding content to a course, creating an assignment, or scheduling an online meeting for a class, you can easily access Microsoft 365 directly in your LMS workflow. You can also access the latest AI-powered features from Microsoft 365 for Education for LMS assignments, including rubric and instructions generation, suggested feedback, Forms Quiz generation, and more. Microsoft 365 LTI is now in public preview for Instructure Canvas, Powerschool Schoology, Anthology Blackboard, D2L Brightspace, and Moodle. To learn more, see our preview announcement. When: Public Preview now available; Generally Available in Fall 2025. LTI® is a trademark of the 1EdTech® Consortium, Inc. (1edtech.org) 3.Microsoft Learning Zone enters public preview Earlier this year, we introduced Microsoft Learning Zone, a new app built for Copilot+ PCs to help educators create interactive, personalized lessons in minutes. Now available in public preview, the app combines research-informed tools and trusted on-device AI to help educators save time, engage students, and keep content and data secure. We are grateful to the educators, researchers, and partners who have helped shape the experience so far. In the months ahead, we will continue to expand Learning Zone with new features, rich content partnerships, and deeper integration into classroom workflows. Experience Microsoft Learning Zone on a 12-inch Surface Pro When: Learning Zone is now in public preview. If your school is planning to explore Learning Zone, please note that an IT administrator must enable the app before it can be used. View instructions. 4.Microsoft 365 Copilot – Educator Features Teach in the Microsoft 365 Copilot App Microsoft 365 Copilot delivers the latest AI innovations whether through reasoning agents like Researcher and Analyst, or advanced functionality like Copilot Tuning. We recently introduced the updated Microsoft 365 Copilot app, your hub for the latest functionality and later this year in preview, for AI-powered features for educators. In one place, educators will be able to easily create lesson plans, draft materials like quizzes and rubrics, and quickly make modifications like translation, adjusted reading levels, length, difficulty, alignment to relevant standards, and more. This module will be your one stop shop for creating and adapting education content in a guided interface, designed for Education institutions. Teaching capabilities can assist you in drafting the best content for your class, including lesson plans, rubrics, learning activities and more! Guided: Create and adapt content in guided interfaces, reducing the need for advanced prompting techniques, while still giving you full control over Copilot. Grounded: Leverage Education standards from 35 countries, your own content, and your class details to ground Copilot and create content relevant to your class. Available where you are: In the Microsoft 365 Copilot App with the Copilot license - Web, Windows or Mac. When: First functionality previews in Q3 2025. Lesson Plans in Classwork AI generated lesson plans will also be coming to Classwork in Microsoft Teams. Bring your class details and a lesson description, and Copilot will create a lesson outline with suggestions for enhancements. Provide Copilot with relevant files and your education standards for an even more grounded lesson plan. When: In Private Preview July. General Availability end of summer 2025 Education data integration At ISTE this year, we’re thrilled to showcase how Microsoft 365 Copilot is becoming even more powerful for educators with the integration of Assignments and Classwork data. By bringing this rich, contextual classroom information directly into the flow of work, Copilot can now help teachers save time, gain insights, and support students more effectively. Educators can quickly surface upcoming assignments, generate summaries, and even tailor instruction based on the needs of each student— all from within familiar Microsoft 365 apps like Word, Outlook, and Teams. This integration marks a significant step forward in enabling AI-powered teaching, helping educators focus more on what matters most: meaningful student learning. When: Private Preview: Summer 2025 Standards alignment and creation We are excited to share updates on our efforts to bring standards aligned content to our education features. We are partnering with EdGate to integrate learning standards from over 36 countries into our AI features in Teams for Education and Microsoft 365. Integrating EdGate’s comprehensive and global standards set will empower educators to select standards that are relevant to their classes and assignments, allowing them to create high-quality, tailored content. Educators will have the flexibility to choose standards based on location, subject, language, and other criteria. Standards will be seamlessly integrated into all our AI processes in the future. For ISTE, we are happy to announce that our AI Rubric Generator and our new AI Lesson Plan creation tool will be the first features to support standards alignment. Standards alignment will help educators create class materials that are not only relevant and engaging but also pedagogically aligned. When: Summer 2025 Suggested AI feedback for Educators AI feedback suggestions is a new feature that makes it easier for you when you want to provide feedback to students as part of your Assignments flow using Microsoft 365 Copilot. Use the Feedback field as a scratchpad as you review the student work, and have Copilot enhance and summarize it for you. Or, if you are using rubrics, you can have Copilot review your rubric selection and summarize it. Copilot always uses your input as the basis of the suggested summarized feedback, and you will always need to confirm the suggested update and add potential edits, before returning to the student. When: GA now 5.Microsoft 365 Copilot – Learner features Learning activities We’re excited to share that Learning Activities will be coming to Microsoft 365 Copilot this summer! Learning activities is a new Microsoft Education experience designed to help educators and students transform passive content into active learning. With just a few clicks, educators and students can now create engaging practice activities like flashcards directly from existing learning content. Our first learning activity will be AI generated flashcards in Classwork. Educators will be able to add their learning content, select question type and hints, and generate cards. They can then make edits, add images, and even enhance the cards with AI before sharing them with their students. We will also be launching a stand-alone web app for educators to create activities this fall. In the future, we will add more activities like fill-in-the-blanks, mind maps, and matching. Students with Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses will be able to generate their own learning activities in the future too. When: Summer 2025 6. Learning Accelerator updates Speaker Progress We have some great new features coming to Speaker Progress! Speaker Progress is our Learning Accelerator that helps students build confidence in their presentation and public speaking skills with real-time coaching and feedback. Educators can then view speeches and track student progress over time. AI Transcript Feedback in Speaker Progress We are bringing generative AI to Speaker Progress with our new AI Transcript Feedback feature. Educators can choose to enable AI feedback, select a speech type, and evaluation criteria. Student speeches will then receive summary feedback and in line comments to help them improve the content and qualitative aspects of their presentations. The educator is fully in control and must review AI Feedback before it is shared with students. When: September 2025 More languages in Speaker Progress More languages are now available in Speaker Progress, including Spanish, Portuguese, Korean, Japanese, Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, German, French, Dutch, and Danish. Keep checking back regularly as we are adding new languages to Speaker Progress every month! When: Available globally now! Reading Coach Back-to-school webinar: Join the Reading Coach back-to-school webinar on August 26, 2025, 8 am PST to get insights on how to use Reading Coach with struggling and multilingual readers. Register now! Educator features This is your back-to-school reminder that educators can now share custom passages, set reading time goals for learners, and track progress over time through the new guided practice features in Reading Coach. Check out the new Microsoft Learn unit here. Description: Sharing custom practice passages or time goals with learners in your tenant is as simple as using a join code or link. When: Available now Learner features Reading Coach has several new features, including some that make the app appealing to older readers: new dark mode “Midnight” theme with a custom background, a different coach, and coaching voice makes Reading Coach appealing and more accessible to learners across ages. Learners can still mix-and-match coaches, voice with the new Midnight background. The original application theme remains and is named “Sunlight”. agement tips: Learners receive tips to remain engaged and uplevel their reading in each session. Create content with Copilot: Learners of all ages, especially older readers, can use Copilot to brainstorm stories and passages, then bring them into Reading Coach to read in over 80 languages. Leveled fiction and non-fiction Spanish passages in Reading Coach curated content library. When: Available August 2025 Insights API for Reading Coach data Using the Insights Leader Graph API for Reading Coach, education institutions and partners can build custom dashboards to track students’ reading progression in Reading Coach. When: Available now 7.OneNote for Education updates There are plenty of exciting new things to explore in OneNote for Education in time for back to school, including: New Microsoft 365 LTI 1.3 integration – Streamlined LMS access to Class Notebook, Assignments, Reflect, and more Broader OneNote updates – Merge table cells (finally!) and a new option to “paste text only” A reminder about the built-in Class Notebook toolbar in OneNote on Windows and for Mac (no more need to download the add-in!) – How to enable it and why it’s great For all this goodness and more, check out the deep dive blog here. 💜 ____________________________________________________________ And finally, just to recap all the news we have for you this month, here’s a quick review of all the features that are generally available or are rolling out now: Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat for teens (13-17) Microsoft 365 LTI (LMS integration updates) Learning Zone on the Copilot+ PC – public preview now available Microsoft 365 Copilot – Educator Features Teach module in the Microsoft 365 Copilot App Classwork integration AI Feedback Standards integration Learning Activities Microsoft 365 Copilot – Learner Features Learning Activities Learning Accelerators Updates Speaker Progress updates Reading Coach updates OneNote EDU Updates LTI 1.3 integration through the new Microsoft 365 LTI Merge table cells & paste text only Built-in Class Notebook toolbar for OneNote desktop Mike Tholfsen Group Product Manager Microsoft EducationMicrosoft 365 Copilot Chat for Students 13+
With Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat now available to students aged 13 and older, we’re ushering in a new era of AI-assisted learning while maintaining a strong focus on privacy, security, and keeping administrators in control. This blog post is your admin-ready guide to ensure your organization is set up to deliver safe, compliant, and productive experiences with Copilot Chat. Learn more and hear from K-12 institutions who participated in our private preview: Empowering teen students to achieve more with Copilot Chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot Copilot Chat is an AI-powered assistant, offered with Microsoft 365, that helps users find answers, generate insights, and complete tasks—drawing from web-based content and, publicly available information, and limited user file uploads. Unlike Microsoft 365 Copilot, it does not have access to organizational data like emails, documents, or meetings through the Microsoft Graph. This version is ideal for institutions who are looking for a free AI chat solution while maintaining a strict boundary from internal or sensitive data sources. Review an overview of AI solutions from Microsoft Education: aka.ms/EducationAIPortfolio 🏷️ Tenant Identifier: Set the Education Segment for Proper Feature Access We recommend all Education customers take additional steps to manage appropriate deployment: Validate your school type as Higher education, Primary/Secondary/K-12, or Other (research institution, academic library, etc.) to help us tailor the search and chat experience for your users. To do this, you will need a PowerShell script: ConfigureTenantEduType.ps1 that you can download here. To run the script, open PowerShell in administrator mode. Also make sure you have the username and password available of a global administrator on your tenant. On your first run, the necessary packages will be installed, hence the administrator mode. Usage: .\ConfigureTenantEduType.ps1 - When no parameter is used the actual setting of the tenant will be retrieved. .\ConfigureTenantEduType.ps1 1 - This sets the tenant identifier to K-12 .\ConfigureTenantEduType.ps1 2 - This sets the tenant identifier to HED. .\ConfigureTenantEduType.ps1 3 - This sets the tenant identifier to other. 📘 Please read our Managing Copilot Chat access for Faculty and Higher Education 18+ student | Microsoft Community Hub for full details. ✅ Why AgeGroup Matters—and How to Set It To enable Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat for students, the ageGroup attribute in Entra ID (formerly Azure AD) must be set correctly. This field ensures compliance with child privacy regulations like COPPA and FERPA by verifying whether a user is under 18. Here’s how to check and set it: Use Microsoft Graph API or Microsoft Entra Admin Center to view and update the ageGroup attribute. Acceptable values: Minor, NotAdult, Adult For students aged 13 and up, use NotAdult. Any student set to NotAdult will have access to Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat. Use bulk update tools or provisioning solutions to automate setting this for all student accounts. [Important] When you set the students aged 12 and under to 'Minor' make sure to set the 'ConsentProvidedForMinor' field to 'Granted' or 'NotRequired'. 📘 Please read our AgeGroup blog post for full details. 🛠️ Managing Agents in Microsoft 365 Admin Center Copilot now supports agent-based AI experiences that can be scoped, customized, and secured. With the Microsoft 365 admin center, you can: Enable/disable Copilot features for specific user groups Manage access to custom Copilot agents Use the Copilot Control System to monitor usage and enforce security policies from day one To learn more, check out the Manage agents for Microsoft 365 Copilot in Integrated Apps - Microsoft 365 admin | Microsoft Learn and leverage the Agent Success Kit – Microsoft Adoption 🔐 Security and Data Protection You Can Trust Copilot Chat brings the same enterprise-grade security and compliance protections you've come to expect from Microsoft 365. As a part of this enterprise data protection your data stays private (we won’t use your data except as you instruct) and your data isn’t used to train foundation models. Learn more about enterprise data protection. Highlights include: Built-in data residency and encryption Access controls and permission-based data retrieval Protection from prompt injection and harmful content Advanced reporting on readiness, usage, and security posture One important consideration: Copilot does not change or override your existing permissions model. It respects the access a user already has in Microsoft 365—whether that’s to files, emails, chats, or other content. However, this also means that if a document is overshared or accessible more broadly than intended, Copilot may surface its content to anyone with permission to see it. Access to the content is not caused by Copilot—it’s visibility and access that already exists in your tenant. Copilot simply makes that visibility more transparent. Admins should review and remediate over-permissioned content using tools like Microsoft Purview, SharePoint access reviews, or sensitivity labels to avoid unintended exposure of sensitive data. Administrators can go further by using features like SharePoint Advanced Management, sensitivity labels, and Restricted SharePoint Search. Make sure to all read our Safeguarding data with Microsoft 365 Copilot security and compliance blog post by Bill Sluss. 🔍 Next Steps 🏷️ Set your tenant’s education segment (K-12/HED/Other) ✅ Audit and update AgeGroup attributes. 🛠️ Configure Microsoft 365 Admin Center to have the right settings for Agents creation and consumption. 🔐 Review your security and data protection settings for Copilot. ⚙️ Explore the Microsoft 365 Copilot technical readiness guide. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat – Microsoft Adoption With these steps, you’re not just enabling Copilot—you’re empowering safer, smarter learning with AI.
