News and insight

Finances of Higher Education Providers 2014/15 shows that UK HE providers had a total expenditure of £31.2 billion in 2014/15. £11.8bn (38.0% of the total) was spent through academic departments. Medicine, dentistry and health departments accounted for 8.7% of total expenditure.

Today’s essential reading (on the train, in my case) is the IFS report authored by Anna Vignoles of Cambridge and Neil Shephard of Harvard. This is the second report from a landmark research project that uses HMRC tax data, SLC loans data, and HESA Student data to find out about some of the factors that affect graduate earnings.

This week a group of staff from across HESA attended the SROC conference at Loughborough University, both as delegates and presenters. It was a great pleasure to present on the latest developments with Heidi Plus, on how to use HESA data, and on strategic and operational changes happening at HESA.

The survey results show the number of new and on-going spin-off companies associated with UK HE providers. 129 spin-offs were started with some provider ownership in 2014/15. 4,160 graduate start-up companies and 138 social enterprises were formed

The full tables show the national non-continuation rates and indicators for every publicly funded HE provider in the UK alongside their benchmark.

Further tables show the statistics for entrants to part-time and other undergraduate courses.

Three of the UK's leading higher education agencies have announced plans to explore increased collaboration and cost sharing through a new partnership to be known as the 'M5 Group'.

HE Finance Plus 2014/15 shows that the total income of higher education providers in 2014/15 was £33.2 billion.² Tuition fees and education contracts contributed £15.6 billion or 47% of this total. The total expenditure of UK HE providers was £31.2 billion, of which £17.1 billion (55%) was spent on staff costs.

Data published today show that there were 198,335 academic staff employed at UK HE providers in 2014/15. When analysed by cost centre (a proxy for academic departments) nearly a quarter of these staff (24%) were working in the areas of medicine, dentistry and health.

Data published today show that 745,005 higher education qualifications were awarded by UK HE providers in 2014/15. This is 4% fewer than were awarded in 2013/14. While 6% fewer first degrees were awarded than in the previous year, the number of postgraduate qualifications rose by 1%. The number of other undergraduate qualifications awarded, such as diplomas and certificates of HE fell by 10%, continuing a four year downward trend. 

Indicators for Widening Participation are published today on our website. The full tables show the indicators for every publicly funded HE provider in the UK alongside their benchmark.