Learning gain

The Higher Education Learning Gain Analysis (HELGA) strand of the learning gain programme investigated the potential for using existing data on the student experience to identify what it tells us about learning gain. This explored whether administrative data can provide a low burden approach to a proxy measure for learning gain.

About the strand

Our work explored two statistical modelling techniques:

• The first methodology can account for observable characteristics such as gender and ethnicity.
• The second methodology sought to account for unobservable characteristics such as a students’ preference for a particular region.

The models used data from the start of a student’s higher education journey and compared it with data collected at the end of their undergraduate experience.  

The findings of this strand of work have been published in an evaluation report.