11/01 - July

New for 2010/11! Checkdoc Compare facility

The data collection system will provide a second version of the check documentation for every re-commit/test-commit processed by an institution. This version of the check documentation presents a colour shaded version of the Excel spreadsheet with variances being highlighted. 

Check doc guide

To assist institutions in the role of review of committed data HESA provides a guide to assist in the interpretation of check documentation. This guide is available from the collection page.

New for 2010/11! HIN Compare facility

From 2010/11 the HIN report will include a comparison tool enabling institutions to view the progress made between submissions. The report will feature the number and exact records failing a rule along with a percentage change column to enable faster analysis of changes between submissions.

NSS report

From 2010/11 additional fields have been included in the downloadable files  to assist institutions in using the files and recreating the populations. These include the expected end date, the total FTE calculation and Course.COURSEID. Full details of these changes can be found in the downloadable file structures page.

Updates to the Minerva DQ Database

Following institutional feedback the Minerva system will be upgraded to provide some additional functionality. 

New for 2010/11! Exception Report compare facility

To assist comparison of commit transactions the Exception reports will be retained on the system for all commit transactions. The reports will feature the number and details of records failing a rule along with a percentage change column to enable quicker recognition of changes between submissions.

Downloadable Exception Report

You can also download a copy of the entire Exception report for a commit transaction from the 'Download Exception Report' link located at the top of the report page. The on-screen report is limited in the number of errors/warnings that can be displayed. Using the download link enables institutions to access the totality of exception report errors/warnings.

Data Supply Files

The Data Supply files are available to download following every successful test_commit/commit transaction. These files provide the HESA derived fields and populations along with and the majority of the Student Record data fields in flat files to enable institutions to replicate the populations used in the check documentation. The files can also be exported to institutions' local systems to act as a basic data management tool. This year a new module table will be added to the data supply file, and Instance.INSTCAMP has also been added to the CORE table. From 2010/11 these files will be downloadable in both CSV and XML format.

Information Reporting Interface Service (IRIS)

From 2010/11 IRIS will be available to institutions in Scotland and Wales as well as in England and Nothern Ireland. The HESA data collection system will automatically send a file to the funding council following every successful commit in order for the funding councils to conduct their reconciliation calculations, and, for English and Welsh institutions, to produce summaries of data used in analysis and funding calculations. A similar service will be provided to institutions in Scotland. Further details will be circulated by SFC. The results of these calculations will then be fed back to institutions through the HESA data collection system. Institutions are expected to scrutinise these results and amend any errors in their data. Note: this service will not impact upon processing during the HESA Student Record data system.

 

Record contact changes

The record contact is the first point of communication during data collection. Access and PIN codes will be sent out to your institution's nominated record contact. If these details have changed please ensure you notify liaison@hesa.ac.uk to prevent any delay in the receipt of these codes.

Tariff calculation for 2010/11

The tariff score attributed to Scottish Higher and International Baccalaureate qualification has changed this year. Consequently HESA has recalculated the tariff score for all instances on the HIN register. As a result of this institutions may notice a change in tariff score between years. The derived field 'XTARIFF04' will be replaced with 'XTARIFF' that will refer to the current tariff table.

QUALENT3

From 2010/11 a new field QUALENT3 will be included in the Student Record. This records the highest qualification on entry for students with a COMDATE on or after 01 August 2010; there is no need to recode continuing students. Institutions should only return either QUALENT2 or QUALENT3 for each record because returning a student with both QUALENT2 and QUALENT3 will fail validation.

New EXCHANGE codes

Two new codes have been added to the valid entries for Instance.EXCHANGE for 2010/11 to identify collaborative provision between a UK HEI and an overseas institution. Details on the use of these codes can be found in the field description in the coding manual.

Interaction with colleagues

The Student Record provides data on cost centres which interacts with the HESA FSR with HE-BCI and Staff Records, as well as data which is incorporated into the EMS Record. Therefore please ensure you liaise with the colleagues responsible for completing these returns in order to ensure consistency of reporting.     

ITTPHSC for SAS and SKE programmes

New validation rules and guidance are in place for 2010/11 to ensure that the correct codes are returned in Instance.ITTPHSC for students with TTCID = E or F. Note that code 49 'Other' cannot be used for these students.

• For SAS students ITTPHSC must be coded 76 or 81
• For SKE students ITTPHSC must be coded in the range 71-81

STULOAD for writing-up students

It remains mandatory for STULOAD to be attributed to writing-up students. From 2010/11 institutions are advised that the FTE allocated to writing-up students should be 10% for both full and part-time students.  The 10% applies where the student has been writing-up for a full year. Where a student has only been writing up for part of the year the FTE should be adjusted accordingly.

 

 

TINST

To assist in the analysis of provision by region, HEIs are expected to return generic codes 4001, 4003 and 4004 for the TINST field in exceptional circumstances only. In almost all circumstances institutions are expected to fill this field in with the correct UKPRN. Where institutions in England return a generic code and a UKPRN is available HEFCE may ask the institution to resubmit data to correct the omission. 

 

HEFCW Circular W11/05HE

Welsh institutions should refer to the Higher Education Data Requirements 2010/11 circular (HEFCW circular W11/05HE) for details of HESA data that will be used in analysis, for funding and in the monitoring of the maximum student number. Institutions should ensure in particular that the quality of the fields detailed in the data requirements circular is high and that the output of the IRIS system and the check documentation is scrutinised in order to detect errors and correct them before final submission of data to HESA.

Changes to the check documentation

Key changes to the check documentation for 2010/11:

• The Performance Indicators (PI) sheet has been reviewed this year and tables A and B will no longer appear. Tariff calculations will now be displayed in item 8 of the main workbook. Data on unknowns has been incorporated into item 11 of the main check documentation and the PI sheet itself will no longer be checked by HESA.
• Item 11 - in addition to the above the use of unknown and refused codes for DISABLE will no longer be checked in item 11 as the introduction of the new coding frame for 2010/11 means that it is no longer possible to monitor this information.
• Information on QTS awards will be incorporated into item 2 of the main workbook. The ITT sheet has been retained for institutional use, but with the removal of 14-19 Diplomas (ITTPHSC = 83) as these qualifications are no longer available.
• Item 7 (previously item 8) of the check documentation, will now look at QUALENT3 rather than QUALENT2. Where a tariff bearing qualification has been returned it is expected that relevant data will be returned in the QualificationsOnEntry entity.
• A new front sheet has been introduced containing a checklist to assist in the overall review of data, with some Headline Notes.

A check documentation guide is available to assist institutions in quality assuring their data.

Changes to COMMIT stage validation

 Key changes to validation:

• A new exception warning has been added to the PREVINST field to highlight any codes returned which do not correspond to the look-up table used by HESA. Institutions are asked to contact HESA where they believe these highlighted codes to be genuine so that they can be added to the table in time for the calculation of the Performance Indicators.
• The POSTCODE look-up file used by HESA will be updated in September. When the system opens in August postcode data will make reference to the May look-up table. Institutions may therefore fail validation on genuine postcodes which are not yet recognised by the validation. If this is the case institutions are advised to contact HESA and request a temporary switch to enable these to pass validation. Note that institutions must check that these are genuine and valid postcodes in order for the switch to be approved. In early-mid September HESA will switch to using the August look-up table and data for affected institutions will be reprocessed to take this into account. At this point temporary switches to postcode validation will be removed and any remaining postcodes which fail validation will need to be corrected. 

Full details of the COMMIT-stage validation rules can be viewed on the collection page under the heading 'COMMIT-stage validation'. Details of changes for 2010/11 can be found in the Revision history document.

 

C10051 Timescales

August 2011	C10051 data collection opens
15 September 2011	Return date
22 September 2011	Commit date
22 September to 31 October 2011	Data quality checking period
31 October 2011	Last submission and sign-off

The full schedule for data collection can be viewed at C10051 Timescales. 

Revision history

Institutions should ensure that they refer to the most recent version of the coding manual. Any changes to the coding manual are listed within the Revision history.

Collection user guide

A step-by-step guide on how to submit Student Record data to HESA can be viewed in the Student collection user guide. 

Minerva user guide

Help with using the Minera data quality (DQ) database can be viewed at Minerva user guide.

Support centre

Further guidance on completing the return, including guides on different types of student/programme and help with specific fields as well as information on the HUSID Look-up Service and data collection system can be found in the Support Centre.

Need Help?

Contact the Institutional Liaison team on 01242 211144 or email liaison@hesa.ac.uk.