Institution profile record 2013/14
Timescales - stages of data submission
Version 1.1 Produced 2014-02-28
This document is designed to guide institutions through the stages of data submission for the C13041 Institution profile data collection.
At a glance
| Early 2014 | Institutions' local preparation |
| May 2014 | C13041 data collection opens |
| 1 June 2014 | Return date |
| 2 June to 16 June 2014 | Data quality checking period |
| 16 June 2014 | Last submission |
| 18 June 2014 |
Sign-off |
Detailed requirements
| Early 2014: INSTITUTIONS' LOCAL PREPARATION |
Institutions should read the C13041 Institution profile coding manual and associated documentation for details of the requirements for this return.
Academic cost centre data returned in the Institution profile return will be incorporated into COMMIT-stage validation for the Student, Staff and FSR with HE-BCI returns. It is therefore recommended that colleagues responsible for the Institution profile record liaise with those responsible for these other collections, to ensure all required cost centres are returned.
If you have any queries about the requirements for the C13041 Institution profile data collection please contact Institutional Liaison.
| April to May 2014: C13041 INSTITUTION PROFILE PREPARATION GUIDE |
In advance of the data collection opening HESA releases the Institution profile preparation guide. This guide provides further guidance of the requirements for the collection year, with reference to any areas HESA's Statutory Customers wish institutions to pay particular attention to during coding and submission.
Notification of the publication of this preparation guide will be sent to both Institution profile record contacts and the Admin-HESA JISC mailgroup. If you would like to join Admin-HESA please contact Institutional Liaison.
| May 2014: C13041 DATA COLLECTION OPENS |
The C13041 collection database opens on the Submit site around a month before the return date providing institutions with the opportunity to interact with the data collection system ahead of the return date deadline.
A user guide for the submission of C13041 Institution profile collection data please will be made available shortly before the collection opens.
Access and PIN codes for this system will be distributed to Institution profile contacts when the data collection opens.
HESA monitors all transactions on the system to ensure institutions are progressing reasonably and not encountering issues. However, if you require assistance with the submission process, please contact Institutional Liaison.
| 1 June 2014: RETURN DATE | KEY DEADLINE |
Institutions are required to send complete data that has passed commit-stage validation to HESA by 1 June 2014. This schedule allows the maximum amount of available time for data quality checking.
Data submission is through submission of XML-fornatted data files.
To meet the requirement of the return date institutions are required to:
- Check the campus details held on the system and confirm whether they remain accurate; making amendments where necessary.
- Provide data regarding the mapping of academic departments to cost centres. Provision of cost centre data is compulsory for institutions in England. Provision of cost centre data is optional for institutions in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. All institutions are however encouraged to submit cost centre data as the data collected in this record will be used to validate the Student, Staff and Finance records as well as providing benchmarking material for heidi.
- Process a commit transaction. This will then send a copy of the submission to the HESA Data Quality Assurance team for HESA to undertake some analysis of the return in parallel with the institution conducting their own detailed analysis.
Data which fails validation will not be considered to have been returned to the Agency.
A summary of Institution profile will be displayed on screen for confirmation.
Institutions are reminded that primary responsibility for data quality rests with them; HESA aims to support institutions in ensuring their data are of the highest quality through the provision of check documentation and parallel scrutiny of same. Institutions are therefore advised to ensure that sufficient time is spent examining the check documentation produced through a successful commit to check that errors have not been introduced which would cause any degradation to data quality. As institutions are in a better position than HESA to recognise more detailed anomalies within their data, using local knowledge of the intricacies of their own institutions, they are strongly encouraged to closely scrutinise the check documentation reports.
| 2 June to 16 June 2014: DATA QUALITY CHECKING PERIOD |
Institutions can contact Institutional Liaison throughout this period to request that their data is decommitted in order to make revisions and resubmit data. The data quality checking period is an iterative process during which institutions may need to submit, commit, review and decommit their data several times in order to ensure that the final submission is of sufficient quality and is credible.
During this period Data Analysts at HESA will also examine data committed by all institutions. If any anomalies are found queries will be raised through the Minerva DQ database. Nevertheless institutions are in a better position than HESA to recognise more detailed anomalies within their data, using local knowledge of the intricacies of their own institution. As a consequence institutions are required to either resubmit their data to amend these anomalies, or provide an explanation through Minerva as to why these apparent anomalies are genuine.
Submitted cost centre data will be used in the validation of cost centres submitted in the HESA Student, Staff and Finance records. Institutions are encouraged to liaise with colleagues responsible for these other returns to ensure the submitted cost centre data is an accurate reflection of the institution's profile.
Upon satisfactory completion of this process data will be set to credible.
| 16 June 2014: LAST SUBMISSION |
In order to meet obligations for hand-over of data to its customers, HESA needs to receive all data files by 16 June 2014.
| 18 June 2014: SIGN-OFF |
As part of the data quality assurance procedures, HESA requires the return to be signed-off by the head or acting head of your institution. This verification offers both the institutions and HESA assurances regarding onward use of the data. Sign-off completes the data collection process.
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On the system your institution's data will be set to credible and a new icon will be made available from where the sign-off form can be downloaded and completed. Once completed, the form should be posted back to HESA. Please note that the transaction number on the sign-off form must correspond to that of the data being signed-off. |
Note: Institutions should download and keep copies of all relevant reports that they are likely to need during the year, as it will be necessary to restrict access to the submission site after the submission deadline.
| Onward use of C13041 Institution profile collection data |
Following the close of the data collection all data submitted will be passed to HESA's Statutory Customers and also to the HESA Information Services team.
The C13041 Institution profile collection data is also used as metadata for the C13051 Student record, C13025 Staff record and the C13031 Finance record in order to associate students and staff to the campus and cost centre at which they are located.
Cost centre information will also be used in heidi to assist in benchmarking.
Contact Liaison by email or on +44 (0)1242 388 531.