HESA's progress towards 'data present'

Well 2019 is here, the year that students who will be submitted to 2019/20 start! It is no longer Data Futures, but instead much closer to ‘data present’.

We released version 2.0.0 of the Student 2019/20 specification in October 2018 and since then we have been making minor changes. This is usual practice and part of our work for and on behalf of HE providers, even following a stable release. As we work through comments and questions some outcomes result in model changes.

The Data Futures team have been working to finalise any outstanding model issues. We have also drafted as much guidance as possible where requested, including: recording FTE, placement data, persistent HUSID, and postgraduate research (PGR) students.

Following the responses received for the FTE consultation item (ID 60757), we have been working very closely with statutory customers to find a balance on the reporting requirements. We have had some very helpful conference calls with both HE providers and statutory customers together and this has really helped enormously with getting to a solution that works for both parties. We would like to continue this approach to resolve other issues – so if there is something you would particularly like to help with, please do get in touch.

We are working with the General Medical Council (GMC) to understand requirements for medical students, including placement data and the current Module marks field. The GMC are keen to hold some workshops with HE providers in the coming months to understand better how data is held in their systems, to potentially update the model for 2020/21.

Your questions help us to understand where we need to provide more guidance  

The work to understand more clearly what is required for PGR students is ongoing, but we now understand statutory customer expectations better. We hope to be able to issue you with much clearer examples and guidance very soon.

Now that the OfS have identified their new regulatory requirements, we can confirm the data that approved providers will be required to return – and the good news is Module data will continue to not be required.  

There have been several examples where HE providers have asked us a question about a data item and when it is explored in more detail, has resulted in data items being removed from the model. This was case with Module subject (for HE providers in England) and the Regulatory reference body number. So please, do keep sending your questions in, as it really helps us to clarify and to understand where we need to provide more guidance.  

We have gathered a small list of change requests to implement after 2019/20 and we would like to start working through these soon. We will provide updates as soon as they are available.