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Definitions - Staff 2012/13

Coverage

The HESA Staff record provides data in respect of the characteristics of staff employed under a contract of employment at a reporting higher education institution (HEI) in the UK.

Inclusion of an individual in the Staff record depends upon the existence of one or more contracts of employment between the HEI and the individual and/or the liability of the HEI to pay Class 1 National Insurance contributions for that individual (see the HM Revenue and Customs website for further guidance). An individual's employment with a higher education institution (HEI) will be governed by one or more legally binding contracts. The Staff record collects attributes of the HE institution, person, contract of employment, and activities within each contract. Each person will have one or more contracts; each contract will have one or more activities. A member of staff may be employed under a single contract of employment or a number of separate contracts: this will depend on the HEI's employment practices.

The range of data required about an individual and the contract(s) that they hold will depend on the nature of those contracts and also the classification of the activity for which the contract exists.

Data is required for all academic staff, and for non-academic staff if the contract is not atypical. Atypical non-academic staff may be returned on an optional basis. There are four exceptions to this coverage - data need not be returned for:

  • Agency staff
  • Self-employed staff
  • Honorary contracts where the contract is not deemed to be a contract of employment
  • Staff employed not by the HEI, but by a company consolidated into the HEI's accounts.

Atypical staff are those members of staff whose contracts involve working arrangements that are not permanent, involve complex employment relationships and/or involve work away from the supervision of the normal work provider. For atypical staff only a minimum data set is required. Reporting of atypical staff was changed for the 2012/13 collection with institutions only obliged to return atypical staff on academic contracts. Therefore, for this publication, non-academic atypical staff have been excluded. Further information is given under the definition for Terms of employment.

Staff (excluding atypical) are those members of staff where one or more of the contracts held during the reporting period cannot be defined as atypical, and includes open-ended/permanent and fixed-term contracts. For these staff there is a requirement to return a wider range of data (which may include salary information and start and end dates of employment and contracts).

Academic staff are defined as staff at least one of whose contracts of employment was for an academic function and whose contract activity can be categorised as 'Managers, directors and senior officials', 'Professional occupations' or 'Associate professional and technical occupations' as defined by the 2010 Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) major groups 1, 2 or 3. This may therefore include vice-chancellors and other senior academic managers, medical practitioners, dentists, veterinarians and other health care professionals whose contract of employment includes an academic function.

The academic employment function may be teaching, research, teaching and research or neither teaching nor research (where an academic professional has taken up a senior administrative responsibility but there is no change to the academic function in their contract of employment).

Non-academic staff are defined as those that do not have an academic employment function. They include managers, non-academic professionals, student welfare workers, secretaries, caretakers and cleaners.

The reporting period for the 2012/13 HESA Staff record is 1 August 2012 to 31 July 2013.

Populations

The HESA staff atypical population is an indicator of those individuals who have only atypical contracts within the reporting period.

The HESA staff atypical population is used in analyses of atypical staff person attributes by full-person equivalents (FPE).

The HESA staff contract population is an indicator of those contracts that were active on 1 December within the reporting period. Atypical staff contracts are not counted in this population. Other staff with a default (or unknown) contract start date, a default (or unknown) contract end date and a contract full-time equivalent (FTE) of zero, are also not counted in this population.

The HESA staff contract population is used in analyses of staff contract attributes by full-person equivalents (FPE).

The HESA staff contract session population is an indicator of those contracts that were active during the reporting period. Atypical staff contracts are counted in this population.

The HESA staff contract session population is only used in analyses of staff cost centre activity, or when summing full-time equivalents (FTE) from the contract table, during the reporting period.

Rounding strategy

Due to the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Human Rights Act 1998, HESA implements a strategy in published and released tabulations designed to prevent the disclosure of personal information about any individual. This strategy involves rounding all numbers to the nearest multiple of 5. A summary of this strategy is as follows:

  • 0, 1, 2 are rounded to 0
  • All other numbers are rounded to the nearest multiple of 5.

So for example 3 is represented as 5, 22 is represented as 20, 3286 is represented as 3285 while 0, 20, 55, 3510 remain unchanged.

This rounding strategy is also applied to total figures, the consequence of which is that the sum of numbers in each row or column rarely matches the total shown precisely. Note that staff data calculated by full person equivalents (FPE) will also be rounded in accordance with this strategy.

Average values, proportions and FTE values prepared by HESA are not usually affected by the above strategy, and are calculated on precise raw numbers. However, percentages calculated on populations which contain 52 or fewer individuals will be suppressed and represented as '..' as will averages based on populations of 7 or fewer.

Full-time equivalent

Staff full-time equivalent (FTE) is defined by the contract(s) of employment and is proportioned to each activity's cost centre. FTE indicates the proportion of a full-time year being undertaken over the course of the reporting period 1 August to 31 July. The FTE is therefore counted using a population of staff who were active during the reporting period, not just on a given snapshot date, and uses the HESA staff contract session population.

Full-person equivalent

Individuals can hold more than one contract with an institution and each contract may involve more than one activity. In analyses staff counts have been divided amongst the activities in proportion to the declared FTE for each activity. This results in counts of full person equivalents (FPE). Staff FPE counts are calculated on the basis of contract activities that were active on 1 December of the reporting period (using the HESA staff contract population).

Atypical full-person equivalent

Individuals can hold atypical contracts with an institution and each contract may involve more than one activity. In analyses staff counts have been divided amongst the activities in proportion to the declared FTE for each activity. This results in counts of full person equivalents (FPE). Atypical staff FPE counts are calculated on the basis of those individuals who have only atypical contracts that were active during the reporting period (using the HESA atypical staff population).

Mode of employment

Full-time staff are those whose contracts state that their mode of employment is full-time. This includes staff who work full-time for part of a year and term-time only staff who work full-time during the term.

Part-time staff are those whose contracts state that their mode of employment is part-time.

Mode of employment is an attribute of the contract, not the person. Therefore, a person will be counted as wholly part-time, even if they hold a number of part-time contracts that sum to one FTE. The FPE allocated to the full-time category will only reflect the people that hold a full-time contract. This is consistent with the treatment of other attributes of the contract.

Terms of employment

Terms of employment describe the type of contract(s) a member of staff has with the higher education institution (HEI) at the date the data is returned to HESA, or date of leaving if earlier.

Open-ended/permanent staff are those who are employed on a contract of employment that states the member of staff as permanent or on an open-ended contract. This includes term-time only staff who are employed on an open-ended contract.

Fixed-term contract staff are those employed for a fixed period of time or with an end date on their contract of employment. This includes staff on rolling fixed-term contracts.

Atypical staff are those whose working arrangements are not permanent, involve complex employment relationships and/or involve work away from the supervision of the normal work provider. These may be characterised by a high degree of flexibility for both the work provider and the working person, and may involve a triangular relationship that includes an agent. Source: Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Discussion Document on Employment Status, July 2003, paragraph 23.

In addition to this definition from the DTI, some HE specific guidance has been devised by HESA in consultation with HEIs. Atypical contracts meet one or more of the following conditions:

  • Are for less than four consecutive weeks - meaning that no statement of terms and conditions needs to be issued.
  • Are for one-off/short-term tasks - for example answering phones during clearing, staging an exhibition, organising a conference. There is no mutual obligation between the work provider and working person beyond the given period of work or project. In some cases individuals will be paid a fixed fee for the piece of work unrelated to hours/time spent.
  • Involve work away from the supervision of the normal work provider - but not as part of teaching company schemes or for teaching and research supervision associated with the provision of distance learning education.
  • Involve a high degree of flexibility often in a contract to work as and when required - for example conference catering, student ambassadors, student demonstrators.

Source of basic salary

Source of basic salary indicates whether contract salaries are paid wholly or in part from funds other than general institution funds. Whether income can be regarded as general institution funds or not depends on the distinction between general and specific income as defined in the Statement of recommended practice: accounting for further and higher education (SORP), published by Universities UK. Specific income is that which can only be applied to a specific purpose or activity so designated by the grantor or donor.

Wholly general institution financed staff contracts are those paid wholly from general institution funds.

Partly financed by the institution contracts are those paid partly, or wholly, from sources other than general institution funds.

Multiple sources of salary includes staff returned with multiple sources of basic salary, where these sources do not include either Wholly general institution financed or Partly financed by the institution.

All other sources of basic salary listed are the sole source of salary for that contract

Academic employment function

The academic employment function of a member of staff relates to the academic contract of employment and not the actual work undertaken.

Teaching only staff are those whose contracts of employment state that they are employed only to undertake teaching.

Teaching and research staff are those whose contracts of employment state that they are employed to undertake both teaching and research.

Research only staff are those whose contracts of employment state that the primary academic employment function is research only, even though the contract may include a limited number of hours teaching (up to 6 hours per week or pro-rata for part-time staff).

Neither teaching nor research staff are those whose contracted academic employment function is neither teaching nor research, e.g. Vice-Chancellor.

Highest qualification held

The highest qualification held indicates the highest qualification held by the member of staff.

Doctorate includes doctorate degrees.

Other higher degree includes other higher degrees (including masters degrees).

Other postgraduate qualification includes other postgraduate qualifications (including professional qualifications) and Postgraduate and Professional Graduate Certificates in Education (PGCE).

First degree includes first degrees (including those with Qualified Teacher Status (QTS)).

Other undergraduate qualification includes other qualifications at first-degree level (including professional qualifications), Diploma of Higher Education (DipHE), Higher National Diploma (HND), Higher National Certificate (HNC) and all other undergraduate qualifications (including professional qualifications).

Other includes A level, Scottish Higher or equivalent; O level/GCSE or equivalent; other qualifications and no qualifications.

Unknown includes those staff whose highest qualification held was unknown.

Movement of academic staff

The movement of academic staff provides analysis of the nature of the previous employment of staff before appointment at the current higher education institution (HEI) and the destination after leaving employment of the reporting HEI. Where previous employment was reported as 'Another UK HEI', the HESA institution code of the HEI at which the member of staff worked is also reported.

Starters are members of staff who did not hold an academic contract of employment on 1 December in the previous reporting period but held one on 1 December in the current reporting period.

Inflow - where a starter whose contract of employment in the previous reporting period was neither the current institution nor another UK higher education institution (Other UK higher education institution), they are deemed to be new to the UK HE academic staff sector.

Leavers are members of staff who held an academic contract on 1 December in the previous reporting period and did not hold one on 1 December in the current reporting period.

Outflow - where a leaver whose destination on leaving was neither the current institution nor another UK higher education institution (Other UK higher education institution), they are deemed to have left the UK HE academic staff sector.

Contract levels

Professor indicates a member of staff holding a contract which aligns with the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) contract level 5A 'Professor'. This level indicates a senior academic appointment which may carry the title of Professor but which does not have departmental line management responsibilities. Further guidance on the levels to which contracts can be aligned may be found here.

Prior to 2012/13, 'Professor' was a term associated with those returned in the HESA Staff record as holding a contract for a professorial role, and as such the data is not directly comparable across years.

Salary range

Salary range is based on the contract salary for members of staff at each institution where applicable, at 31 July in the reporting period, or the end date of the contract if earlier.

For analysis purposes the contract salaries are grouped into six salary ranges, the upper and lower of each range aligned with salary spine points used in the JNCHES Pay Spine (previously referred to as the Final Salary Spine) as detailed in the HESA document Single pay spine (Salary from 1 August 2012 column).

Contract salary not applicable includes members of staff for whom the concept of a per annum contractual salary does not apply e.g. hourly paid staff, staff with zero hour contracts etc.

Contract salaries reported to HESA based on the reporting of the JNCHES Pay Spine, the JNCHES Clinical Spine, plus salaries not set against a nationally negotiated pay spine are included in this analysis. Where HESA is provided with both a salary point (within the JNCHES Pay Spine or JNCHES Clinical Spine) and an enhanced salary figure (e.g. London weighting), the actual enhanced salary is used.

Staff with atypical contracts are not included in the salary range analysis.

Note: Staff salary relates to the entire contract and not the individual activities that may be associated with that contract. Therefore, whilst a staff contract may be assigned to more than one activity group, the salary displayed will reflect the entire contract.

Cost centre groups

In certain analyses cost centres have been assigned into cost centre groups, which reflect both academic similarities and comparable resource requirements.

Medicine, dentistry & health

  • 101 Clinical medicine
  • 102 Clinical dentistry
  • 103 Nursing & allied health professions
  • 104 Psychology & behavioural sciences
  • 105 Health & community studies
  • 106 Anatomy & physiology
  • 107 Pharmacy & pharmacology.

Agriculture, forestry & veterinary science

  • 109 Veterinary science
  • 110 Agriculture, forestry & food science.

Biological, mathematical & physical sciences

  • 111 Earth, marine & environmental sciences
  • 112 Biosciences
  • 113 Chemistry
  • 114 Physics
  • 122 Mathematics.

Engineering & technology

  • 115 General engineering
  • 116 Chemical engineering
  • 117 Mineral, metallurgy & materials engineering
  • 118 Civil engineering
  • 119 Electrical, electronic & computer engineering
  • 120 Mechanical, aero & production engineering
  • 121 IT, systems sciences & computer software engineering.

Architecture & planning

  • 123 Architecture, built environment & planning.

Administrative & business studies

  • 133 Business & management studies
  • 134 Catering & hospitality management.

Social studies

  • 124 Geography & environmental studies
  • 127 Anthropology& development studies
  • 128 Politics & international studies
  • 129 Economics & econometrics
  • 130 Law
  • 131 Social work & social policy
  • 132 Sociology
  • 145 Media studies.

Humanities & language based studies & archaeology

  • 125 Area studies
  • 126 Archaeology
  • 137 Modern languages
  • 138 English language & literature
  • 139 History
  • 140 Classics
  • 141 Philosophy
  • 142 Theology & religious studies.

Design, creative & performing arts

  • 143 Art & design
  • 144 Music, dance, drama & performing arts.

Education

  • 135 Education
  • 136 Continuing education
  • 108 Sports science & leisure studies.

In certain analyses cost centres 101 to 145 may be grouped together as academic cost centres.

Academic services

  • 201 Total academic services.

Central administration & services, staff and student facilities

  • 202 Central administration & services
    204 Staff & student facilities.

Premises

  • 205 Premises.

Residences & catering

  • 206 Residences & catering.

Age

Age is as at 31 August in the reporting period.

Sex

This field records the legal sex of the staff member, as opposed to the gender with which they identify.

Due to the requirement to return this information to HM Revenue & Customs, legal sex information will be known for all staff with the exception of those holding solely non-academic atypical contracts, for whom sex may legitimately not be known.

Ethnicity

It is HESA's practice to adopt national classifications where they exist and are appropriate. The use of Census 2011 ethnicity coding in the Staff record is an example of this. The coding frame was recommended by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) for UK-wide data collection. However, there are variations to the Census 2011 ethnicity coding adopted in Scotland and Northern Ireland. The ethnic category groupings are:

White includes the HESA valid entries of White, White - Scottish, Irish Traveller, Gypsy or Traveller and Other White background.

Black includes Black or Black British - Caribbean, Black or Black British - African and Other Black background.

Asian includes Asian or Asian British - Indian, Asian or Asian British - Pakistani, Asian or Asian British - Bangladeshi, Chinese and Other Asian background.

Other (including mixed) includes Mixed - White and Black Caribbean, Mixed - White and Black African, Mixed - White and Asian, Other Mixed background, Arab and Other Ethnic background.

Where staff of known ethnicity appears in analyses, this includes all staff returned as White, Black, Asian or Other (including mixed).

Where ethnic minority staff appears in analyses, this includes all staff returned as Black, Asian or Other (including mixed).

Not known includes both Not known and Information refused.

Staff may choose not to reveal their ethnicity and therefore HESA advises that the figures reported in analyses are derived from a subset which may not be representative of the total staff population.

Disability status

Following introduction of the Disability Equality Duty, information is required about the nature of disability. From 2008/09 HESA has, on the recommendation of the Equality Challenge Unit (ECU), adopted a version of the coding frame developed by the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) which includes additional detail specifically relevant in education.

Disability indicates whether a member of staff is disabled and the type of disability on the basis of their own self-assessment. Staff are not obliged to report a disability, and therefore HESA advises that the figures reported in analyses are derived from a subset which may not be representative of the total staff population.

The full label descriptions for each disability are available in the HESA Staff record coding manual.

In certain analyses disability may be grouped as follows:

Known to be disabled includes those members of staff that reported a disability.

No known disability includes those members of staff that reported they have no known disability.

Known disability status includes those members of staff that reported they have no known disability, plus those that reported a disability.

Unknown includes those members of staff that were reported as Information refused.

Nationality

Nationality defines the country of legal nationality. This is not necessarily the domicile. The code list is determined by the National Statistics Country Classification 2006 (NSCC).

Further information and a list of the HESA nationality valid entries are available in the HESA Staff record coding manual.

UK nationality includes staff whose nationality was the UK, and for the purposes of analysis includes Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man. Officially, the Crown Dependencies of Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man are not part of the UK or the EU. Guernsey and Jersey in this context refer to the Bailiwicks of Guernsey and Jersey, which includes their smaller islands.

Non-UK nationality includes staff whose nationality was a country other than that defined as UK nationality.

Where shown separately, Cyprus (European Union) includes staff whose nationality was reported as Cyprus (European Union) or Cyprus not otherwise specified. Staff reported as Cyprus (Non-European Union) are included in all other Non-EU countries.

European Union not otherwise specified includes staff whose nationality was reported as Czechoslovakia not otherwise specified. Obsolete nationalities may be returned by staff who emigrated at a time when the nationality was current and they have never acquired any other nationality.

All other Non-EU countries includes staff whose country of legal nationality is not shown separately under Non-EU countries, plus those reported as stateless.

Unknown includes staff whose nationality was not known or it was impossible from the available documentation to assign a nationality from the code list.

Country/Region of institution

The allocation of an institution to a geographical region is done by reference to the administrative centre of that institution. There may be staff employed in regions other than that of the administrative centre of the institution.

HESA allocates HEIs to Regions as follows:

North East (NEAS), North West (NWES), Yorkshire and The Humber (YORH), East Midlands (EMID), West Midlands (WMID), East of England (EAST), London (LOND), South East (SEAS), South West (SWES), Scotland (SCOT), Wales (WALE) and Northern Ireland (NIRE).

Although the Open University teaches throughout the UK, its administrative centre is located in South East England, and it is counted as a wholly English institution.

Institution identifiers

INSTID - Institution identifier (INSTID) is the unique identifier allocated to institutions by HESA.

UKPRN - UK Provider Reference Number (UKPRN) is the unique identifier allocated to institutions by the UK Register of Learning Providers (UKRLP).

SOC - Occupational coding for higher education staff

The Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) provides a national standard for categorising occupational information. SOC forms the basis of occupational classification in a variety of national surveys that collect statistical information such as the Labour Force Survey and New Earnings Survey. The utilisation of SOC for classifying occupations within the HE sector therefore allows for the heterogeneity of occupations that exist and enables comparisons to be made with other sectors of the economy from a variety of data sources.

From 2012/13, HESA has used the SOC2010 variant of the SOC coding frame here. This version maintains the same nine Major Groups used in previous versions of SOC, but it is no longer possible to replicate the variant previously used by HESA for staff in the HE sector, which permitted staff to be grouped into thirteen broad occupational activities. In addition, the association of academic and non-academic activities solely with SOC Major Groups is no longer possible, due to the incorporation of both types of activities at the sub-Major level. Consequently, staff may be pursuing an academic or non-academic activity within a given SOC Major Group, whereas previously certain SOC Groups were held to be entirely academic or non-academic in their own right.

The publication of staff activities by SOC Major Group may therefore now occur with or without reference to the academic nature of that activity, whereas previously this was implicit in the titles of the activities published. Care should be taken when comparing data across years.

Activity SOC Major Group

  • 1 Managers, directors and senior officials
  • 2 Professional occupations
  • 3 Associate professional and technical occupations
  • 4 Administrative and secretarial occupations
  • 5 Skilled trades occupations
  • 6 Caring, leisure and other service occupations
  • 7 Sales and customer service occupations
  • 8 Process, plant and machine operatives
  • 9 Elementary occupations.

In certain analyses, Activity SOC Major Groups may grouped as follows:

Managerial, professional and technical staff are those with a contract activity in SOC Major Groups 1, 2 or 3.

Clerical staff are those with a contract activity in SOC Major Group 4.

Manual staff are those with a contract activity in SOC Major Groups 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9.

Academic employment marker

In certain analyses the staff activities may also be split by academic contract and non-academic contract:

Academic contract staff are defined as professionals holding a contract for planning, directing and undertaking academic teaching and research within HEIs. Examples of such contracts include those for vice-chancellors, medical practitioners, dentists, veterinarians and other health care professionals who undertake lecturing or research activities.

Non-academic contract staff are defined as members of staff who are not holders of an academic contract, including managers, non-academic professionals, student welfare workers, secretaries, caretakers and cleaners.

Clinical status

Clinical academic staff includes doctors, dentists, nurses and midwives (registered with the relevant professional council) who normally undertake clinical duties in addition to teaching and/or research; doctors and dentists who, as part of their training, undertake a period of dedicated research; registered clinical academic health professionals, plus other academic staff involved in the delivery of patient care as well as teaching and/or research.

Note: Clinical academic staff are not necessarily paid on a clinical academic pay scale.

Non-clinical academic staff are those members of staff who do not meet the conditions of clinical academic above.

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