Legacy Modernization for Education & Research: The Way to Digital Sovereignty

Legacy Modernization for Education and Research: The Way to Digital Sovereignty

Short: Published: 26 January 2026 (Updated 6 May 2026) Author: Björn Groenewold Reading time: 5 minutes

Published: 26 January 2026 (Updated 6 May 2026) Author: Björn Groenewold Reading time: 5 minutes

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Key Takeaways

• Digitization has reached every part of society. But education and research face unique, complex IT challenges.
• Universities and research institutions rely on IT systems built decades ago.
• These systems now block the integration that modern research and teaching requires.

"The real challenge in legacy modernization is not the code — it is keeping operations running without disruption." — Björn Groenewold, Managing Director, Groenewold IT Solutions

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Why Outdated IT Blocks Innovation

Short: Universities, colleges, and research institutions handle large volumes of data every day.

Universities, colleges, and research institutions handle large volumes of data every day. But many of their core IT systems are decades old. They worked well when they were built.

Today, they prevent institutions from integrating the tools modern research and teaching demands.

What Makes a System a Legacy System

Legacy systems rely on outdated hardware, software, or programming languages. In education and research, they share common traits:

• High maintenance costs: Specialist staff and spare parts for old hardware are scarce and expensive. Maintenance eats most of the IT budget.
• No scalability: These systems were not built for growing research data volumes or rising student numbers.
• Security vulnerabilities: Outdated software no longer receives security updates. Institutions become easy targets for cyberattacks.
• Poor integration: Connecting these systems to cloud services, e-learning platforms, or mobile apps is difficult or impossible.

Despite these limitations, legacy systems hold real value. They contain the core processes and accumulated data of the institution — student records, research archives, financial histories. Replacing them without preserving this logic causes serious disruption.

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1. Specific Challenges in Education and Research

Isolated Systems Across Departments

Universities typically run separate systems for library management, campus administration, student information, and research data. These systems do not talk to each other. Staff transfer data manually between them. Errors accumulate. Reporting requires significant manual effort.

Budget Constraints and Specialist Shortages

Legacy systems are expensive to run. Maintenance costs push out innovation budgets. Finding IT specialists who understand older technologies — COBOL, PowerBuilder, proprietary databases — is increasingly hard.

Institutions become dependent on a shrinking pool of external experts.

Compliance and Data Protection

Research institutions handle sensitive data. This includes personal data from study participants, confidential research results, and financial records. GDPR and sector-specific rules require systems that meet current security standards.

Legacy systems often cannot meet these requirements without costly workarounds.

Research Data Management

Large research projects generate terabytes of data. Legacy storage and database systems were not designed for this volume. Data retrieval is slow. Incompatible formats and restricted access hinder collaboration between research groups.

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2. The Goal: Digital Sovereignty

Short: Digital sovereignty means an institution controls its own IT infrastructure, data, and processes.

Digital sovereignty means an institution controls its own IT infrastructure, data, and processes. It does not depend on proprietary systems it cannot change or extend. Modernization builds toward this goal step by step.

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3. Three Proven Modernization Approaches

API-First Integration

Instead of replacing core systems immediately, APIs are built around them. Modern applications — e-learning platforms, research data portals, mobile apps — connect through these APIs. The legacy core keeps running. New services layer on top without disrupting existing operations.

This approach works well when:

• The legacy system contains complex business logic that is hard to replicate
• Immediate replacement carries operational risk (for example, during exam periods or active research projects)
• Budget needs to be spread across multiple years

Gradual Migration

Individual modules or functions are migrated to modern platforms one at a time. The student information system is modernized first. The library system follows six months later. Each migration is a contained project with a defined scope and rollback options.

Benefits of this approach:

• Operations continue throughout the process
• Each completed migration delivers immediate benefits
• Lessons from early migrations improve later ones
• Risk is spread across smaller, manageable projects

Full Replacement with Data Migration

Sometimes full replacement is the most cost-effective path. This applies especially when a legacy system is a single, aging application with no complex custom logic. A modern standard platform replaces it. Historical data is migrated.

The old system is shut down.

This approach requires:

• A clean inventory of all data in the legacy system
• Defined data migration rules and quality checks
• Parallel operation of old and new systems during the transition
• Clear cutover criteria before the legacy system is switched off

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4. What IT Managers Need to Address First

Short: Before starting a modernization project, answer these questions:

Before starting a modernization project, answer these questions:

• Which systems are truly critical — and which could be replaced without disruption?
• Where is data duplicated across systems, and which system holds the master record?
• What integrations exist between systems today — APIs, batch transfers, file imports?
• Which regulatory requirements affect the architecture — GDPR, sector-specific data rules?
• What is the realistic budget for a multi-year modernization program?

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5. How to Get Started

Short: A structured approach reduces risk and keeps operations running:

A structured approach reduces risk and keeps operations running:

1. Conduct a system inventory — list every application, its age, its dependencies, and its data
2. Classify systems by importance and modernization urgency
3. Identify one isolated, lower-risk system as a pilot modernization project
4. Run the pilot and document what you learn
5. Use the pilot results to plan and budget the wider program

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References and Further Reading

• Bitkom — German digital industry association
• German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI)
• European Commission — Digital strategy
• MDN Web Docs (Mozilla)
• W3C — World Wide Web Consortium

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About the Author

Short: Björn Groenewold (Dipl.

Björn Groenewold (Dipl.-Inf.) is Managing Director of Groenewold IT Solutions GmbH and Hyperspace GmbH. Since 2009 he has been developing software solutions for the mid-market. He has supported more than 250 projects — from legacy modernization to AI integration.

Areas of expertise: Software Architecture, AI Integration, Legacy Modernization, Project Management