Who are HESA: The Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) is the official agency, appointed by the Office for Students (OfS), for the collection, analysis and dissemination of data about Higher Education in the UK. The University is required as part of OfS registration to make returns to HESA.
HESA gathers, analyses and quality checks the data it receives before sharing it with the OfS, universities, researchers, students and potential students and policy makers. The data is used for strategic planning, informs policy making, and supports both research and prospective students’ decision making.
How have we made returns to HESA until now: Until this academic year the HESA student return has been an annual single exercise looking back at the previous year. In order to make this return, the University utilises data from the student record system and from a number of local sources, which often requires reformatting in order to make the data fit for the HESA return. This is all changing from the academic year 2022-23, with the introduction of HESA Data Futures.
What is HESA Data Futures? This is a new sector-wide approach to the way institutions return data about their student body to HESA. It includes a new and expanded data model (the data we are required to return), a new data collection platform and milestones for eventual in-year data collection, assurance and dissemination of HE data.
When is Data Futures happening? The new student return process is scheduled for implementation in 2022-23. The University will make its first interim return in May 2023. In-year data returns will start in the academic year 2024-25.
About the HESA Data Futures Project
The HESA Data Futures project is preparing the University for the changes to the way our student data is collected, organised and returned to HESA and will make sure that the University meets its statutory reporting requirements to the Office for Students.
The project began in August 2022 and will complete in November 2023 when the Vice-Chancellor signs of our first HESA Data Futures return. The work will then revert to a business-as-usual activity.
The project has two work streams:
- A Technical Change stream – designed to prepare our IT systems for the new data model
- A Business Change stream – designed to ensure that the University’s data-owners have all the information they need to meet the new requirements. The project team has begun briefing data-owners about the new requirements.
What the change means for Sussex
The requirement to capture a greater breadth and depth of information will provide the University with more timely high quality data, enabling better planning and decision making at all levels.
With the introduction of in-year submissions to HESA, there will be less time to check and validate data prior to submission; there will therefore be a greater focus on data quality and on data maintenance.