Calendar Integration: Microsoft/Office 365/Exchange

Overview

The Meeting Scheduler module permits students to make appointments with advisors and other staff based on their institutional calendar and availability settings configured in Student Success & Engagement (SS&E) User Settings.

In order to use the Meeting Scheduler module it must be enabled by Watermark staff. If you have not requested the Meeting Scheduler module to be enabled, please contact your Customer Success Manager or Implementation Project Manager. Once enabled, Meetings must be configured within Student Success & Engagement Administration and integrated with the institution's calendar system.

More information/instructions: Enable Meeting Scheduler

Required Access

To complete this integration, the following access is required:

• SS&E Administrator Access
• Microsoft/Azure AD tenancy Administrator Access
• Powershell Administrator (local computer) Access

Microsoft Calendar Integration

Watermark staff will enable Meeting Scheduler within SS&E. The Microsoft Calendar Integration can be completed by the institution's SS&E Administrator and IT department/calendar system administrator, following the instructions below:

1. The Microsoft Calendar administrator should create a Service Account (AccountName@school.edu) in Office 365 or Microsoft Exchange. 

   Note: this should be a regular account, not a shared mailbox.

   • This is the account whose calendar will "own" the meetings produced by the SS&E Meeting Scheduler.

   • When meetings are created through SS&E, they will be created on this calendar and the attendees (staff and student) will be invited to the meeting.

   • Meeting invites will be delivered from this account so it should be named appropriately, service account names like "SSE Scheduler" or "CollegeName Appointment Scheduler" are commonly used.

   • The Service Account should have access to read the calendars (free/busy permission) of all staff at your institution, as well as the ability to invite users to meetings.

   • The Service Account should be granted the AvailabilityOnly -AccessRights permission on the mailboxes of any staff that could accept meetings from within SS&E.

   • Autodiscover must be enabled.
     To test whether Autodiscover is enabled for your institution, utilize the Remote Connectivity Analyzer from Microsoft, found here: https://testconnectivity.microsoft.com/.

2. The Microsoft Calendar administrator should add Watermark SSE to Enterprise Applications.
   (this step enables the "New Meeting Scheduler" features released in 2024)

   • Click this link and sign in with an administrator account.

   • After accepting the permissions, you will be redirected to watermarkinsights.com. To confirm the integration, make sure that Watermark SSE has been added to your enterprise applications.

     Note: This integration employs the Graph API.

3. Enable the Meeting Scheduler Module in SS&E Administration (Administrator access is required) and limit permissions in PowerShell:

   • Navigate to Meetings > Meetings Configuration. 

   • Select the Microsoft button, then check the Enable Meeting Scheduler box.

   • Enter the Service Account name and email address (usually the same).

   • Select OAuth 2.0

   • Basic Authentication is no longer supported as it has been deprecated by Microsoft. It is present for backwards compatibility reasons.

   • Click Grant Exchange Access.

   • Log in as an Microsoft Administrator.

   • Limit Permissions in PowerShell. The permissions that are granted include access to all mailboxes. SS&E only needs access to the service account mailbox. 

     • Open Powershell as administrator

     • Restrict access to just the service account mailbox with the following commands:
       

       Install-Module -Name ExchangeOnlineManagement
       Import-Module ExchangeOnlineManagement
       Connect-ExchangeOnline

        

     • When prompted to log in, sign in as the Microsoft Administrator for your tenancy.
       

     • Copy the custom PowerShell script from the Meetings Configuration page, OR use the following script, updating the {service account address} with the service account email address that you created.
       

       New-ApplicationAccessPolicy -AccessRight RestrictAccess -AppId "b38378a7-2b51-42ac-b264-3f6247d6c409" -PolicyScopeGroupId {service account address} -Description "Restrict Aviso EWS access to the service account mailbox only."

        

     • The AppId is for the Aviso App, and this is the same value for all SS&E clients.

     • Note: PowerShell Configuration Troubleshooting can be found at the end of this article.

   • Verify that the Tenant Id is linked.

   • Save.

4. The integration can be tested after these steps and the Meeting Scheduler Configuration/User Settings steps are completed. You can test by impersonating a test student and scheduling a meeting with a staff member. The staff member must have availability set up in their user settings.

   Note: If you are in implementation or a consulting project for this feature, you can let Watermark staff know that the calendar integration steps have been completed and which staff member you would like to be the test user.  

Meeting Scheduler Configuration

After the calendar integration is complete, the institution should verify that Meeting Type, Service Delivery Location, and Service Offering are configured completely and correctly in the Administration screens. More information/instructions: How to Configure Meeting Scheduler

User Settings

To use Meeting Scheduler, staff, faculty, and advisor users must choose to accept meetings by syncing their calendar and setting up their meeting availability in their individual User Settings. This can only be done after Calendar Integration and Meeting Scheduler Configuration steps are complete. See Advisor instructions for New Meeting Scheduler for instructions.

Additional Information

• If you have configured or used Meeting Scheduler in the past (prior to the Meeting Scheduler upgrades in Summer 2024), you will need to complete or verify the integration and configuration.
• If an institution has both Google and Microsoft Calendars on campus, they should integrate with the calendar system that staff users will be using for meeting availability.
• Instructions for Google Calendar Integration can be found here.

Integration Applications

The SS&E Calendar Integration uses two integration apps.

• The Watermark SSE app employs the Graph API to quickly fetch calendar availability for multiple users at once.
• The Aviso App uses the service account user to create meetings and invite staff and student users. 

Troubleshooting

If these steps have been completed but users are unable to schedule meetings as expected, review the Meeting Scheduler Troubleshooting article.

PowerShell Configuration

If the following error is received:

ExchangeOnlineManagement.psm1 cannot be loaded because running scripts is disabled on this system.

Enable the ability to run scripts for the current user:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted

After running all the commands, optionally run the following to re-disable the users' ability to run scripts:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser -ExecutionPolicy Restricted

Basic Authentication

Microsoft has deprecated Basic Authentication. Please see the following article published by Microsoft for more details: Basic Authentication Deprecation in Exchange Online – September 2022 Update

To upgrade from Basic Authentication to OAuth2.0, follow steps 2 and 3 above to enable the Meeting Scheduler Module in SS&E Administration (Administrator access is required) and limit permissions in PowerShell.

Meeting Scheduler Error: Once deprecated, we have seen that institutions suddenly find that meeting scheduler stops working and displays an error stating that "There was a problem loading the available time slots". Moving to OAuth usually fixes the error.