People drink the KoolAid and here we are. This is just the middle management disease that takes over everything unless people are very careful.
Just because YOU don't understand the complexities behind managing an organization with 22k employees and 16k dependents doesn't mean it's any less important.
This is the equivalent of a CFO saying spending on data redundancy is an unnecessary cost because it is a waste of opex - to translate to you as a DevOps wonk.
Payroll, inventory ... what else? Student grades maybe. Contact info for studemts and employees. Essentially keeping a simple db schema.
Why exactly are Universities all-inclusive day cares for young adults covering every life need under a single administrative umbrella? It's like a capitalist commune. Landlord, hospital network, a few professional sports teams, dozens of amateur sports teams, several restaurant chains, life coaches, a police force, and on and on and on.
They do everything, the things they do they overcomplicate, and they overreach control of every tiny thing all under one umbrella. Of course it's absurdly expensive, but there's no reason it needs to be besides there's no incentive for anybody to cut back on anything ever.