Microsoft remains clear leader in global education market

While there has been a fair share of praise showered upon Google’s efforts in education with the slow increase of Chromebook usage by schools predominately in the US, Microsoft’s Education Team would like to remind folks: they’re not doing too shabbily themselves with Office 365 and Windows 10.

We’re really excited to see even more students and educators around the world using and loving Windows 10 and Office 365. According to a Futuresource report, Microsoft remains the global leader in the education market, with 46 percent of the global K-12 education OS market share and six percent year-over-year growth.

Additionally, IDC reviewed over 76 million job posts looking for the most in-demand skills in today’s workforce and the skill’s needed for tomorrow’s best jobs and found proficiency in Microsoft Office ranked in the top 10.

Some handpicked anecdotal stories that particularly tickled Microsoft’s fancy regarding the necessity of Office 365 and Windows 10 adoption and use include:

• By upgrading to Windows 10, Aiken County Public School Districts now has a consistent technology platform across all devices and scenarios, access to multimedia in the classroom, increased opportunities for research and greater collaboration among students and teachers. “The best thing about our switch to Windows 10 is the great outcome that we get for our students and teachers,” says Andrew Cox, J.D, Director of Technology at Aiken County Public School district. He also shared that the Windows 10 upgrade was free and runs faster with greater reliability on existing Windows 8 and Windows 7 devices. Read his story.
• Saint Stephens College in Australia moved to Office 2016 after using a combination of solutions for many years. Peter West, Director of eLearning said, “The benefits are already becoming obvious with easier training and less support time, which will result in more learning time for students/less time out of class for IT support.”
• Modesto City Schools in California deployed 12,000 Windows-based devices (expected to grow to 45,000 within 5-years) and Office 365 to improve teaching and learning and to provide cloud-based access to the latest productivity and collaboration tools. “With mobile Windows-based devices in the classroom, students can access more resources when and where they need them … they can look things up, read what interests them, dig deeper, ask more questions” said Cindy Minter, Senior Director of Information and Technology Services.

As school administrations seek better and more affordable tools to aid in education, the mere mention of iPads, Chromebooks, or (yes there a few) Linux machines should keep Microsoft stringent delivering experiences for education that offer real value. From OneNote Class Notebooks to free Skype in the Classroom sessions, Microsoft’s new cloud-based software-as-a-service approach to its offerings is becoming arguably a boon for educators.