Students getting removed from their teams/groups (by School Data Sync?)

Question

Hi!

I'm having an issue with students being removed directly after their added into teams/groups. It doesn't occur to all groups/teams, and it suddenly occurd to teams that have been fully funtional for some time. We're using School Data Sync (SDS) to provision teams and users. It seems like SDS "changes its mind" directly after the students are being added and then removes the same batch of students.

From the Audit Logs in Entra of the relevant groups it says that the action is initated by "microsoft teams services" and by the user agent "TeamsMiddleTier/1.0a$*+".

I have controlled the data flow for SDS, and it seems to be is in good shape.

Does anyone have an idea of what could be causing or triggers this type of behaviour.

PS: I'm a newbie to SDS and its functions - so its fully possible that it could be something obvious that i am missing...

Thanks in advance.

Jo F.

Answer 1

Hello @Øiamo, Jo Fredrik

 

Thank you again for posting your question and for sharing the audit log details. I truly appreciate your effort in describing the issue clearly. 

Based on my research, this behavior aligns with how School Data Sync (SDS) is designed to operate. SDS synchronizes data from your Student Information System (SIS) and uses that data to manage memberships in Microsoft 365 Groups and Teams. If the SIS data does not show a student as actively enrolled in a class, SDS may interpret this as a mismatch and automatically remove the student during its next sync cycle. 

This can happen due to: 

• Missing or outdated enrollment records. 
• Expired endDate values in the source files. 
• Manual changes made directly in Teams or Entra ID that conflict with SDS-managed data. 

To be fully transparent, I’d like to clarify the limitations of my role in this situation:  As a forum moderator, I do not have access to backend systems, diagnostic tools, or administrative permissions to investigate or resolve tenant-level issues. My experience with SDS is limited to general guidance and documentation, and I’m not equipped to access or verify the backend processes that may be affecting your environment. 

To ensure this issue is properly addressed, I strongly recommend that you raise a support ticket via the Microsoft 365 Admin Center. This will allow a backend support engineer to: 

• Review your SDS sync profile and logs in detail. 
• Investigate the root cause using internal tools. 
• Work directly with you to resolve the issue. 

Please visit the Microsoft 365 Admin Center, then click “Help & Support” in the lower-right corner and submit a support ticket describing the issue. 

I hope this message helps clarify the situation and points you in the right direction.

If you have any updates, additional information, or further questions, feel free to let me know. I’ll be here and happy to continue working with you on this. 

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