Software Available to Faculty, Staff, and Students for Free or at an Educational Discount

Bates offers access to a wide range of software applications to support teaching, learning, research, and administrative functions. While most of our software licenses are restricted to Bates-owned machines, we do have a few licenses that permit installation on personal devices for students, faculty, and staff.


The following is a list of software that is available to members of the Bates College Community at no cost:

  • ArcGIS
    • Geographic Information System (GIS) Software
    • Follow these Instructions to Download
  • ChemDraw/ChemOffice
    • Scientific Software
  • JMP® Student Subscription
    • Data Analysis Software
  • MATLAB - MathWorks
    • Programming and Numeric Computing Platform
  • Mnova
    • Software Suite Designed for Combined NMR and LC/GC/MS Techniques
  • Microsoft Office for Students
    • As a Bates Student, you have access to the Microsoft Office 365 for Education Suite (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, as well as access to Microsoft's Cloud Apps).
    • To access and sign in to your account, please use the following link https://www.office.com/?auth=2
      • When signing in to this site, use your Bates username, appended by: @bcis.bates.edu (username@bcis.bates.edu), and use your network password. 
  • Microsoft Office 365 for Education
    • Bates Staff Working from Home
  • SensusAccess
    • Allows students, faculty, and staff to automatically convert documents into a range of alternate media 
  • Read & Write
    • Text-to-speech capabilities for eBooks, websites, emails and documents
  • Wolfram Alpha Pro 
  • Wolfram Mathematica
    • Software for Technical Computing for R&D and Education 
  • Zoom Video Conferencing Platform
    • Video and Web Conferencing
    • All Faculty, Staff, and Students are eligible for a Zoom Professional account. Just sign in to the Bates Zoom Portal, and click on the "Just login to your account" button to get started and set up your account.
  • Zotero
    • Free and open-source citation management software that helps Bates students, staff, and faculty members collect, organize, and cite sources found online and in library databases. ​​​​​​​

Any licensed application not listed is limited to use on Bates-owned machines. Access from off-campus on Bates-owned machines requires the Bates VPN software - contact the Help Desk for installation. VPN software is limited to use on Bates-owned machines for faculty and staff only. 

Remember that most of our licenses expire on or around July 1. While most licenses renew automatically, some require a bit of intervention. Contact the IT Help Desk should this prove to be the case.

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