Audiences

One data foundation. Every system.

MCDS gives institutions a single, sector-owned data layer that every modern system — student management, finance, HR, research, identity, AI — can speak to. Free for institutions through their peak-body membership.

How adoption works Browse the standard

01 What you get

The benefits, in one read.

Lower integration cost
Stop paying the integration tax.
Every system connection becomes a contract against a shared standard, not a custom mapping project. The savings compound across every system rollout.
Faster regulatory reporting
One model, many regulators.
With reference data aligned to ABS, ISO, and Statistics Canada — and an XBRL-modelled Reporting Framework — regulatory reporting becomes a transformation, not a rebuild.
No vendor lock-in
Swap systems without re-mapping the world.
When the data layer is the standard — not the vendor — moving to a new SIS, a new finance system, or a new analytics platform stops being a multi-year nightmare.
AI you can trust
Trustworthy data in. Trustworthy decisions out.
AI assessment, recommendation, and analytics systems are only as good as their inputs. MCDS gives you semantically consistent, sector-reviewed data.
A real seat at the table
Shape the standard your institution depends on.
Working group membership lets your IT, registrar, IR, and academic teams influence what ships in every release.

02 The Step One Adoption Pattern

A clear blueprint to start.

You don't need to rebuild your data estate. The Step One pattern gives institutions a vendor-neutral, MCDS-aligned data hub that connects to existing systems and grows from there.

Step 1

Stand up an MCDS-aligned data hub.

A central, schema-conformant landing zone for institutional data. Built on cloud or on-prem; vendor-neutral by design.

Step 2

Connect existing systems incrementally.

Map source systems to MCDS one domain at a time — student, curriculum, finance, HR, research. Every connection compounds the value.

Step 3

Light up new use cases.

Reporting, AI, mobility, HCR — all become incremental work on top of the hub, not new integration projects.

03 Cost

Free for institutions through your peak body.

MCDS is free for institutional members of CAUDIT (Australasia) and CUCCIO (Canada). The standard is funded by vendor and implementation-partner licence fees so the sector pays nothing for the substrate.

See full fees & membership →

Ready to start?

Get in touch and we'll walk through how the Step One pattern fits your institution.

One data foundation. Every system.

The benefits, in one read.

Stop paying the integration tax.

One model, many regulators.

Swap systems without re-mapping the world.