Back to C14061

Version 1.1 Produced 2014-07-10

Key Information Sets (KIS) are required to be returned by all providers in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales for all undergraduate courses (with the exceptions outlined below). Undergraduate courses are those in the HESA Student record with Course.COURSEAIM beginning H, I, J and C. Additionally, courses with a Course.COURSEAIM of M22 and M26 (integrated masters courses) should be included.

Welsh FECs reporting via the LLWR use the same coding frame in the HE14 field (details at The Lifelong Learning Wales Record (LLWR) Support Manuals page).

Undergraduate courses in the LAD/LARA are those with a Learning Aim Type of 0031, 0032, 0394, 1406, 1407, 1408, 1409, 9000, 9002, 9107, E007, 1449, 9110, 9111 or 9112 (code lists are available from LEARNING_AIM_TYPES.CSV at http://providers.lsc.gov.uk/LAD/downloads/LADdownload.asp).

The KIS collection 2014/15 should include records for all courses with start dates between 1 August 2015 and 31 July 2016.

For the purposes of KIS, a course is defined as a programme of study to which a student can apply, either through UCAS or directly to the provider. Thus, if students can apply separately to courses in Physics, Chemistry and Biology, each would require a separate KIS. Whereas if students can only apply to a course in Science and later choose to specialise, then a single KIS would need to be produced.

The same guidance applies where courses have optional exit points - if it is possible for a student to apply solely for the lower award then a separate KIS would need to be produced, provided that the course met the FTE requirement given below. For example, if a student can apply for either MEng and BEng then two separate KIS are needed. If all apply for MEng with a possibility of leaving with a BEng then only one KIS is needed.

For courses with multiple subjects where students may choose whether or not to follow a balanced or major/minor combination, a seperate KIS is not required for each, however the provider may choose to provide one.

Separate KIS must be produced for two presentations of a course if the fees differ.

The provider that returns the KIS is dependent on the funding arrangements for the provider(s) delivering the course. Full details of who should return the KIS can be found in the Collaborative provision document.

KIS records for franchise courses will normally be provided by the provider that is responsible for teaching students, the exception is where all students at the provider are franchised from a single provider. Where a provider receives public funding and has its own Higher Education provision, apart from that which is franchised in, it would be expected that they would make their own KIS return. Overall responsibility for the return of the KIS remains with the registering provider. Further information is available in the Collaborative provision document.

Providers must ensure a KIS is produced for every eligible course on which they will register new students in 2015/16. Full details of who should return the KIS can be found in the Collaborative provision document.

Multiple KIS are not required for courses with multiple start dates.

Courses which are new, i.e. have no students attached for 2010/11 and/or 2011/12 and/or 2012/13, should have a KIS returned. This should include the subject, level and mode information. The HESACourse and ILRAims entities should not be returned in such cases. For new courses, a KIS should be produced as soon as the course is advertised.

A KIS should not be produced for courses outside of the coverage, for example, a KIS must not be produced for a course which is only one FTE year or less (see below).

Courses for which a KIS should not be returned

There are some courses at providers for which no KIS information is required at all, these are:

• All postgraduate courses, including graduate entry programmes, with the exception of Course.COURSEAIM of M22 and M26, referenced in the Student record
• Courses where the total FTE of the course is one year or less when studied full-time (i.e.120 credits or less for its entirety)
• Courses where the total FTE of the course is equal to one year that has more than 120 credits
• Closed courses (as defined in Course.CLSDCRS) - courses that are not open to any suitably qualified candidate and will typically be courses offered only to employees of particular organisations
• Courses offered mainly overseas with a location of study mainly overseas, which the funding body has not specifically sanctioned as eligible for funding. A course is considered to be offered mainly overseas if, for all students, the majority (over 50%) of their study is overseas. Sandwich courses and courses incorporating a language year abroad will not typically meet this definition, as the time spent abroad will not be the majority of the course.
• Intercalated degrees
• A course that is run in the UK but only for international and/or EU students
• Top-up courses.

KIS types

There are three different types of KIS records (defined and identified by KISCourse.KISTYPE) that can be returned for any given course. A course can only have one KISTYPE, and this is dependent on the nature of the course.

There are three types of KIS and further descriptions of these are given below:

• KISTYPE 1 - Full course level KIS
• KISTYPE 2 - Multiple subject course placeholder KIS
• KISTYPE 3 - Subject level KIS.

KISTYPE 1 - Full course level KIS

KISTYPE 1s are full KIS records required for specific courses.

The following courses require a KISTYPE 1 KIS submission:

• All single subject courses (those with only one JACS code recorded for the course on the HESA Student Record) regardless of intake size
• All multiple subject courses (those with more than one JACS code recorded for the course on the HESA Student Record) where the intake size is greater than 20* students, providers may choose to return a KISTYPE=1 record for courses with fewer than 20 entrants
• All undergraduate teacher training courses (KISCourse.TTCID = 1 or 2) regardless of the number of JACS codes or intake size
• All medical programmes that contain a pre-clinical and clinical element and the distinction in JACS between the clinical and pre-clinical codes is the only reason why the course has multiple JACS codes.

*Following feedback from providers, it has been agreed that they may choose to provide a type 1 KIS for courses with an entry cohort of fewer than 20 if this is less burdensome.

When courses link to multiple HESA/ILR courses with different KISCourse.JACS codes, it is normally necessary to treat the courses as a KISCourse.KISTYPE 2 and link to the most appropriate KISCourse.KISTYPE 3 (KISTYPEs are described below). Note where this has arisen due to data error then the courses with the erroneous subject codes should be removed. An exception is allowed where the course generates course level information for all data published on Unistats.

KISTYPE 2 - Multiple subject course placeholder KIS

KISTYPE 2s are 'placeholders' for multiple subject courses for which a KISTYPE 1 record is not required i.e. the intake size is less than 20 students. The placeholders include links to the relevant UCAS course codes, accreditation, fee and support information, and to related KISTYPE 1 or KISTYPE 3 KIS records. Each KISTYPE 2 KIS record can be linked to up to three KISTYPE 1 or three KISTYPE 3 KIS records but not a mixture of both types.

Example

Poppleton University has a joint honours French and Music course with an intake of only 10 students and therefore completes a KISTYPE 2 KIS record. Poppleton offers a single honours French course (KISTYPE 1 KIS record) but does not offer a single honours Music course. The provider will therefore have to link the KISTYPE 2 course to KISTYPE 3 records as there are not the corresponding KISTYPE 1 records.

In some cases where the provider has appropriate course level KIS (KISTYPE 1) for multiple subject placeholder KIS (KISTYPE 2), it may still be appropriate to link to a subject level KIS (KISTYPE 3). This might happen where the provider is already producing a subject level KIS for at least one of the subjects, and hence students looking at other multiple subject KIS would see subject level information.

Example

Poppleton University offers the following portfolio of courses:

• English - offered as a combined and a single honours
• History - offered as a combined and a single honours
• French - offered as a combined subject only.

English and History will have type 1 and type 3 KIS. French will have a type 3 KIS only.

The English and History programme will display a type 1 KIS for each subject. The English and French programme will display a type 3 KIS for each subject.

In this case a student who is considering both of these programmes would look at two sets of different information for English as a combined subject. This could be confusing, and therefore using subject level KIS throughout might be preferable.

A placeholder KIS is not required where a full (KISTYPE 1) is produced.

A KISTYPE 2 cannot be linked to a mixture of KISTYPE 1 and 3, as this may be confusing for students as data will be produced at different levels.

KISTYPE 3 - Subject level KIS

KISTYPE 3 records provide information about a subject that forms part of a multiple subject course for which no KISTYPE 1 can be produced.

Subject level KIS should be produced for every JACS level 2 subject that is included within a multiple subject course except where a KISTYPE 1 KIS exists for each of the subjects that make up the multiple subject course.

A subject level KIS should also be produced for providers in Wales where Celtic studies is offered as part of a multiple subject course and no KISTYPE 1 exists.

If there are KISTYPE 2 at different levels (first degree or other undergraduate) or modes (full-time and part-time) then a separate KISTYPE 3 KIS will be required for each.

Example

Whilst Poppleton University has a single honours French course (and a KISTYPE 1 for it) they do not have a single honours Music course and therefore are required to produce a KISTYPE 3 record for Music. As a result of there not being a KISTYPE 1 record for each of the subject areas, Poppleton will also need to produce a KISTYPE 3 record for European Languages & Area Studies (regardless of the fact that a KISTYPE 1 record exists for it).

The flow diagram illustrates the types of KIS required in each case.

Further examples

A provider offers a range of courses with intakes as follows:

Flow diagram explaining KISTYPES

Foundation, sandwich and year abroad components

Providers are required to complete the following fields, to indicate if one or more of these components are available:

• KISCourse.FOUNDATION - which indicates whether there is an optional integrated foundation year, a compulsory integrated foundation year, or no integrated foundation year
• KISCourse.SANDWICH - which indicates whether there is an optional sandwich placement, a compulsory sandwich placement or no sandwich placement
• KISCourse.YEARABROAD - which indicates whether there is an optional year of study abroad, a compulsory year of study abroad or no year of study abroad.

If any of these elements are indicated as compulsory, then a CourseStage should be included in the KIS for the course which reflects the component. If any of the components are indicated as optional then a CourseStage should NOT be included in the KIS for the course.

If a CourseStage is included in the KIS for a course then the calculation of the maximum average fee should include the fee for that component.

In this context a component is considered compulsory if there is an expectation that students will take the component. It is recognised that even where such an expectation exists there will typically be some students who do not undertake the component.

The way in which a course is recorded in KIS will depend on the way it is advertised. For example, a provder could choose to advertise a single course with an optional sandwich year in which case a single KIS with SANDWICH= 1 would be produced or alternatively they could advertise two courses one without a sandwich option and one with a compulsory sandwich year in which case two KIS would be produced.

Example

Where a Physics BSc is advertised as a three year course but having an optional sandwich year, the sandwich year should not be included as a stage in the KIS and the maximum average fee should not take account of the fee for this year. If however the course is advertised as a 4 year programme including a year in industry then the KIS should reflect the sandwich year. The proportion of students taking up the option is not a factor in whether the component should be included.

Contact Liaison by email or on +44 (0)1242 388 531.