Dashboard user guide

Associations between characteristics of students are a set of measures that seeks a better understanding of how outcomes vary for groups of students with different sets of characteristics (for example, ethnicity, sex and background). Students are grouped into quintiles relevant to each outcome measure. The student characteristics used to group students should not have an impact on students’ outcomes, but the evidence shows that they do. Students in quintile 1 are least likely to achieve positive outcomes and students in quintile 5 are most likely to positive outcomes Read more about our measures of Associations between characteristics of students.

Refers to the package of information which includes the CSV and excel files containing the data that underpins the interactive data dashboards. It also contains technical documentation.

Combines data across more granular breakdowns and reports the data as a single value. For example, a 2 year aggregate combines data over the latest 2 years of the time-series. Note that this aggregate value will not necessarily equal the average of the values across individual years if the population sizes between them are different.

A statistical term which describes a range of values within which we are confident that the true value lies. More detail is given in ‘Description of student outcome and experience measures used in OfS regulation’.

For the access indicators this is the total number of entrants, for the other indicators it is the total number of students in the population with the attribute in question.

Index of multiple deprivation, as calculated in England only. It is calculated from a basket of measures which classifies areas in England by level of deprivation. It is presented here as five quintiles, where quintile 1 contains the most deprived 20 per cent of the English population, and quintile 5 the least deprived 20 per cent.

The difference between two indicators, in percentage points (for example, the gap between a continuation rate of 98 per cent for non-disabled students and 95 per cent for disabled students would be 3 percentage points).

A percentage showing the proportion of students with a particular attribute or outcome.

Calculated as the numerator divided by the denominator. For the access indicators this shows the proportion of the entrant cohort with the attribute in question, for the other indicators it is the continuation, completion, degree outcomes (attainment) or progression rate as appropriate.

Information about the number of students that counted negatively towards the progression indicator but reported that they had undertaken interim study or significant interim study between graduating and being surveyed as part of the Graduate Outcomes survey. This information is reported as the proportion of students in the progression population.

For the access indicators this is the number of students with the attribute in question, for the other indicators it is the number of students with the attribute in question who achieve the outcome being measured.

An area-based measure, classifying areas according to the likelihood of young people living within them of participating in higher education.

Quintile 1 contains the areas with the lowest 20 per cent of participation rates for the young population; quintile 5 the highest participating 20 per cent.

Read more about our area-based measures of young participation.

The ‘sector’ includes all English higher education providers that are registered with the Office for Students.

A subset of a split indicator type (for example, ‘black’ is an split indicator within the ‘ethnicity’ split indicator type).

A categorisation of students (for example, ‘ethnicity’; also applies to combined categories, such as ‘white and POLAR4 quintile 1 or 2’).

This term refers to the four stages of students’ progression through higher education:

• Access: the profile of students entering higher education.
• Continuation: the percentage of first year students who continue their studies after 12 months (full-time and apprenticeship students) or 24 months (part-time students).
• Completion: tracks students from the date they enter a higher education provider and considers their completion outcomes after four years (full-time and apprenticeship students) or six years (part-time students).
• Degree outcomes (Attainment): the number of students who were awarded first or upper second class degrees.
• Progression: the number of students progressing to highly-skilled employment, further study or other positive outcomes, 15 months after gaining their qualification. These data represent the results of the Graduate Outcomes (GO) survey from 2017-18 onwards.

An area-based measure, tracking underrepresentation by area is based on young students (under 21) who attended state-funded mainstream schools in England. Quintile 1 has the lowest rate of participation and quintile 5 has the highest.

Read more about our area-based measures of young participation.