98/07 - November

Dear Colleague

The 1998/99 (December) HESA Student Record Collection (Ref C98011A)

This Circular sets out the plans for the C98011A data collection.

Timescales for Collection

The critical dates in this collection are as follows

Student Record Validation

As with previous recent data collections, two stages of validation take place; ‘Submission level' validation and ‘COMMIT-stage' validation. Validation kits for the submission level validation rules are available from the Validation section of the HESA WWW server(http://www.hesa.ac.uk/valid/1998/00html.htm). These contain all of the validation checks that are run when files are submitted to HESA.

COMMIT-stage validation checks are only run once a COMMIT request has been received by the data collection system. These checks can only operate within a database-type environment and, therefore, cannot be included in the submission level validation kits. The COMMIT-stage validation checks that will be run during the C98011B collection are listed below. Institutions are reminded that any return that fails COMMIT-stage validation will require a resubmission to be made. Institutions are therefore advised to attempt to COMMIT their data as soon as they have sent the entire return in and have received the appropriate frequency counts and status report.

COMMIT-stage validation checks in the C98011A collection

One new COMMIT-stage validation check is being introduced for the C98011A collection. If an institution completes the NUMHUS field, then there must be no duplicate occurrences of 'HIN' (HUSID+INSTID+ NUMHUS).

Since the NUMHUS is optional in the December collection, any institutions who do not complete the NUMHUS field in this collection will not be subject to this check.

Check Documentation

Once a return has successfully passed the COMMIT stage, check documentation will be automatically printed and despatched. HESA will begin scrutiny of the return at this point and may wish to raise quality issues with the student record contact.

A copy of the check documentation template, along with the definitions used in the analyses can be found on the HESA WWW site at (http://www.hesa.ac.uk/datacoll/check.htm.)

Data in Reduced Returns

As part of the improved quality assurance procedures within HESA, no item of data is loaded to the HESA database unless it has successfully passed through validation. Since the validation process only validates 'required' fields in reduced returns (as specified in Appendix 9 of the Student Record Coding Manual), all other fields in reduced returns are blanked out by the data collection system.

Responses from the Data Collection System

Institutions are reminded that all submission level transactions (CREATE, REPLACE, APPEND, COMMIT) generate responses to the email address quoted in the relevant control file. All return level transactions (DE-COMMIT, POPTAR lists, data checking and sign-off) generate responses to the email address of the record contact as held on the HESA contacts database. The email addresses on the contacts database will be tested shortly after the publication of this circular.

Who to Contact During Data Collection

Institutions should consider Institutional Liaison as a general first point of contact for any HESA issue.

However, the following people at HESA have specific roles in the data collection process:

Further Guidance on Submitting Data to HESA

The HESA WWW site contains guidance on submitting data to HESA. This covers file naming, file structures, FTP transmission and an overview of the data collection process. This document can be found in the Data Collection section of the HESA web site (http://www.hesa.ac.uk/datacoll/home.htm)

Further Guidance on the Student Record 1998/99

Field 27 New entrant to HE

This field relates to year of student on the programme of study. Where Field 30 has a value of 02 or more, then the appropriate code to use in Field 27 is 9 ‘This is not the student's first year on this programme of study'.

Field 52 Special programmes

Code 03 in Field 52 ‘Special Programmes' (SPPRG) is labelled "ACCESS". We would like to clarify that ACCESS is not an acronym, and that this code should be used for all students on access programmes.

Field 54 ITT phase/scope

As a consequence of DfEE Circular 10/97 section 2.3.2, the TTA have advised that existing programmes will have to be re-classified into the new specific age ranges. Therefore continuing students, as well as new students, will need to be re-coded to the new classifications. Certain institutions have identified difficulty where they are reporting details of students who are completing courses that have not been reassigned because they are no longer offered. TTA advise institutions to use academic judgement to choose the most appropriate code in these cases, recognising that this may not be an exact match.

Field 67 Fee band

Code 02 ‘Prescribed undergraduate fee, half fee' should be used for students on a language year out and students on one year of a sandwich course where, although the period of full-time study at the institution is greater than 10 weeks in any year, the duration of not more than two placements taken over any number of years is greater than 30 weeks.

Field 68 Major source of tuition fees

Please note the guidance issued in Student Circular 98/05:

This field should record information about who actually pays the tuition fees and not eligibility to pay tuition fees. Code 01 should include students who have applied to an LEA and been refused any support and so have to pay all of the £1000, as well as those students who decide not be assessed by an LEA and pay all of the £1000 themselves, i.e. code 01 should be used where the student pays all the tuition fees themselves and there is no element of support. Codes 02-97 should be used where somebody other than the student pays the total, or a proportion of, the tuition fees, i.e. where there is some element of support, however small.

Field 148/133 UCAS number

Please note the guidance issued in Student Circular 98/05:

Students who did not enter their current programme of study through UCAS should have 000000000 (nine zeros) returned in this field.

Students who leave before 1 Dec

Institutions are required to return records on both the December and July returns for all students active within the HESA reporting period. However, it was recognised that this requirement would place a considerable burden on institutions. Guidance in the 1998/99 HESA Student Record Coding Manual was amended therefore to permit ‘anyone who leaves a programme of study so early that they are discounted as a starter in the institution's own records' not to be returned to HESA. Following work carried out by the HEFCE, wide variation in practice has been discovered. To allow consistent analysis of HESA records the following guidance is intended to replace that previously given.

Institutions need not return records for students who start a course and leave within the first two weeks without completing. Students who start a course and do not leave within the first two weeks will need a record returned on all applicable datasets. It should be noted that any records returned for students who start a course and leave within the first two weeks without completing will be excluded from any progression analyses by Statutory Customers or HESA. If a student is registered at the institution on the 1 December they must be returned to HESA whether they leave within the first two weeks of the programme or not.

Intercalating Medical Students

After a recent investigation into the data returned to HESA about medical students it would seem appropriate to reiterate certain advice given to institutions about how to return these students.

Field 151/136 Student Instance Number

Medical students who undertake an intercalated first degree should have the same student instance number returned for the intercalated first degree programme as for the original medical course. As a result of this guidance it will now not be acceptable to return a dormant record for the original medical course while the student is following the intercalated first degree.

(An intercalated first degree is where students on a first degree, usually in medicine, dentistry or veterinary medicine, interrupt their studies to complete a one year course of advanced studies in a related topic. On completion of the intercalated year, the student resumes studies on their original programme of study.)

Fields 30 and 72 Year of student on this programme and year of programme

In most cases these fields will be the same. Exceptions to this will be when a student enters directly to the second or later year of a programme, or if a student repeats a year of a programme.

Medical students doing an intercalated first degree as part of their overall programme of study will be coded slightly differently. For example, ‘Year of student on programme' will increase for the year of intercalation, ‘Year of programme' will be the actual year of the programme for the current qualification aim.

For example, a student who follows two years of a medical degree, then intercalates for one year to join the third year of another programme of study to complete a first degree, and then returns to the original programme of study, will in effect do two years of ‘Year of programme'=3; when doing their intercalated year they will be ‘Year of student on programme'=3 and ‘Year of programme'=3. When returning to their clinical course they will be coded as ‘Year of student on programme'=4 and ‘Year of programme'=3.

‘Year of student on programme' should be incremented for the intercalated year whenever it happens. ‘Year of programme' would typically =3 where the non-medical degree (i.e. Biochemistry, Microbiology, Genetics etc.) programmes are 3 years long (may be 4 in Scotland).

Although the pre-clinical and clinical courses are classified separately, both the ‘Year of student on programme' and ‘Year of programme' should follow on consecutively. If a student does change institution between their pre-clinical and clinical studies then these students should still be ‘Year of programme'=3. If the institution has an agreement with another institution for pre-clinical students to undertake the clinical stage of the programme then ‘Year of student = 3. Institutions can use the HUSID Look-up Service (HLS) to identify the HUSID of the student moving from one institution to another (see Student Circular 98/06).

Field 43-46 Subject of qualification aim

In most institutions medical students undertake a two year pre-clinical course (coded A1) followed by a three year clinical course (coded A3). Institutions must make sure that the HESA code in Field 43 is changed from the pre-clinical to the clinical course after the former has finished.

If your medical studies have become integrated then code as a balanced combination of subjects i.e. AA13 for a combination between pre-clinical and clinical medicine. If these courses are integrated then the ‘Year of student on programme' and ‘Year of programme' should be treated as any other programme of study.

The Funding Councils will still only fund for a maximum of 3 years at clinical study rates, but will identify this, not from just Fields 43-46, but also Field 41 Qualaim code 19 (see below for details) and Field 72 ‘Year of programme'. For integrated programmes Funding Councils will fund the first 3 years at pre-clinical rates and the last 3 at clinical rates.

Field 41 General qualification aim of student

A new code 19 is incorporated into this field as from the 1998/99 collection. Code 19 ‘First degree with eligibility to register to practice (doctor/dentist/veterinary surgeon)' will be used in combination with the subject code or codes to identify those degrees which lead to eligibility to register as a practitioner as a doctor, dentist or veterinary surgeon.

A change of general qualification aim of student to code 24 is expected for the intercalated year. If you have any queries on the issues raised in this Circular please contact the Agency's Institutional Liaison Team: Helen Skitt or Alison Berry (liaison@hesa.ac.uk), who will be pleased to help you.

Yours sincerely

C Jane Wild