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Version 1.0 Produced 2015-02-05

Widget

A widget is a small graphic display with a rolling list of three pieces of information from the KIS about the course the user is viewing. The general principles behind the design of the KIS widget are that it should:

1. Be visually neutral yet clearly identifiable
2. Cause minimal disruption to the page
3. Provide useful, credible information to students within the context of a course website
4. Provide a clear call to action to find further statistics.

Widgets will be produced in a vertical and a horizontal format due to the variations in the design and layout of organisational web pages. When a user clicks on the widget they are presented with the full KIS information for that course.

Places KIS information will be provided

Providing information to students in a way that is useful to them, and in places that they want it, is at the heart of the KIS developments. Therefore, the KIS will be available to potential students in the following ways:

1. Published 'in context' on the web-sites of universities and colleges via a KIS 'widget'.
2. On the Unistats website.
3. Through comparison web-sites and facilities provided by other organisations. The Unistats dataset will be freely available to other organisations to use within their own products.

Suppressions

Where providers identify errors in the KIS they may request suppression of all or part of the KIS. It is not expected that this process will be used where there are errors made in the KIS submission as these can be fixed in an updated submission. Rather, this process is designed to cover cases where errors in organisational student or DLHE data lead to incorrect data appearing on the KIS.

Where providers identify errors they should contact: HEFCE ([email protected]) for providers in England and Northern Ireland; HEFCW ([email protected]) for providers in Wales; and SFC ([email protected]) for providers in Scotland; when requesting a suppression detailing the nature of the issue, the precise cause of the problem, and the KIS affected. HEFCE will then remove the entire affected KIS from the Unistats website, a revised KIS without the specific erroneous data will be mounted on the Unistats web-site at the next opportunity.

HEFCE may suppress KIS data, without a request from the provider, where there is evidence of inappropriate influence on the NSS results.

There is no guarantee that other organisations using the Unistats dataset for comparison sites for example, will update their data on a regular basis and so updated or suppressed data may remain unchanged on these sites.

Need help?

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