News and insight

This Statistical First Release (SFR) has been produced by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), in collaboration with statisticians from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), the Welsh Government (WG), the Scottish Government (SG) and the Department for Employment and Learning Northern Ireland (DEL(NI)). It has been released according to the arrangements approved by the UK Statistics Authority. It provides details of the destinations of leavers from higher education (HE) who obtained qualifications in higher education institutions (HEIs) in the United Kingdom (UK), during the academic year 2009/10. The data presented draws on the 2009/10 Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education (DLHE) survey and presents five year time series analyses relating to the 2005/06-2009/10 DLHE surveys.

Alison Allden, Chief Executive of HESA today welcomed the White Paper's call for improvements to the collection and use of information about higher education.

The results of the 2009/10 HE Business and Community Interaction Survey are published today by HESA. The downloadable publication shows that 273 new spin-off companies were set up in 2009/10 to exploit intellectual property originating in UK higher education institutions (HEIs). A further 2422 new start-up companies were set up by staff and recent graduates of HEIs.

The new electronic publication, Finances of Higher Education Institutions 2009/10, is published today by HESA. This new publication replaces the finance component of the former 'Resources of HE Institutions' printed product which addressed both financial and staff data.

HESA has run a survey to capture information about the number and size of private and for-profit providers of higher education in the UK. This work builds on the Universities UK report of March 2010 which examined the role of private and for-profit providers in the delivery of higher education in the UK and explored the different types of provider that fall into this category.

The survey was undertaken at this time to provide information about the extent of private provision within the more extensive higher education landscape referenced in the Browne review. It also aims to provide data in anticipation of the Higher Education White Paper which will be addressing the issues of the "level playing field" for example in the access by students attending private HE providers to state student finance.

The first set of Performance Indicators in Higher Education in the UK 2009/10 are published today.

The newly released HE Finance Plus 2009/10 downloadable publication from HESA shows that the total income of higher education institutions (HEIs) last year was £26.8 billion. Funding bodies provided £9.0 billion of this income, while tuition fees and education contracts contributed £8.3 billion.

The new electronic publication, Staff in Higher Education Institutions 2009/10 is published today by HESA. This new publication replaces the former 'Resources of HE Institutions' printed product which addressed both staff and financial data.

Staff in Higher Education Institutions 2009/10 shows that there were 181,595 academic staff employed at UK Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) on 1 December 2009. Of these, 44% were female, up from 41.9% four years previously. 12.0% of academic staff were from an ethnic minority compared to 10.7% in 2005/06. Nearly a quarter (24.0%) of academic staff in 2009/10 were of non-UK nationality.

The new fully electronic, instantly downloadable, Students in Higher Education Institutions 2009/10 is published today by HESA. The new publication includes more data, in an easier to use format than previous paper and CD volumes.

This is the first release of data from the 2009/10 HESA staff record.

On 1 December 2009 there were 387,430 staff employed in the HE sector, showing an increase of 1% from 1 December 2008. 181,595 (46.9%) were academic professionals compared to 179,040 (46.8%) in 2008.