Summer 2024 Update

Following consultation with the membership and approval from the Steering Group, we are delighted to announce that we have enhanced the Coverage tab in the Institution record (members only) by allowing all members to see more detail about the Outreach and/or Partnership activity an Institution benefited from, including which member delivered that activity. This will enable members to work in partnership to reduce gaps and overlap, inform their strategic planning and reduce the burden on schools.

Summary of Changes

As part of this enhancement work, the following changes have been implemented:

• The Coverage tab now shows a table which displays the Institution Group delivering the activity, the type of activity delivered, the count of activities relating to each row, and the sum of contact hours relating to each row
• There are separate tables for each academic year, and there are four academic years displayed (the current/ongoing academic year, and the three previous academic years). The years displayed are dictated by the Academic Years in which the Institution has received Outreach and/or Partnership delivery
• The fields currently displayed, which provide the ‘Number of Providers’, ‘Number of Activities’, and ‘Sum of Contact Hours’ that the Institution has received of Outreach and/or Partnership activities will be archived and replaced by the Total rows at the bottom of each Academic Year table

Update to the Institution Profile Report

Following theses enhancements, the high-level Coverage tab fields in the Institution Profile Report (members only) will now draw from the enhanced Coverage Tab on the Institution record, and will be populated via the Total Rows at the bottom of each Academic Year table, as opposed to the previous static Coverage tab fields which have now been archived.

Summary of Changes

The Institution Profile Report will not change in its data content, in the context that it will continue to contain the high-level Coverage tab data for the three most recent complete Academic Years. These data points are as follows:

• Number of Providers delivering to the Institution
• Number of Activities delivered to the Institution
• Sum of Contact Hours delivered to the Institution

The field name labels for the Coverage Data fields on the Institution Profile Report have been improved for ease of use, as they now display the exact Academic Year to which they refer to.

Future updates

As per all data in the Institution Profile Report, the Coverage tabs in the Institution Profile Report will be updated when the Institution Profile Report itself is refreshed, which is at minimum monthly following the Edubase monthly update, and following any Institution data update, such as an update to the Characteristics tab data. The creation date of the Institution Profile Report can be checked via the About Tab of the Report.

Permission and Role updates related to these changes

If your role allows you to view Institution records, you will be able to view the Coverage tab. Any members who use Custom Roles will need to update these with the ‘View Institution Coverage’ permission to access the data.

It is important to note that whilst the enhanced Coverage tab can be viewed by all HEAT database roles that currently provide access to Institutions, (and access gained using the appropriate permission for Custom Roles), the data contained within this tab can only be exported by users with the Lead, Lead Lite, Coordinator, Coordinator Lite, and User with Reports HEAT database roles. For more information, please see the New Institution Coverage Export section on this page.

Important information related to these changes

To support this exciting enhancement to the User Interface, we have also developed a new option to export the Institution Coverage data to help maximise its utility. Please see this update on this page for more information.

Following the enhanced Institution Coverage tab development, we are delighted to announce a new Institution Coverage Export is available to members with the Lead, Lead Lite, Coordinator, Coordinator Lite, and User with Reports HEAT database roles only. Members are able to customise access to this export option through Custom Roles, using the ‘Export Institution Coverage’ permission.

Summary of Changes

As per the enhancements to the Institution record Coverage Tab (members only), the Institution Coverage export is at Institution level and contains the following activity data points (relevant to Outreach and/or Partnership activities only):

• The Institution Group delivering an activity to the Institution
• The Type of Activity being delivered
• The count of activities relating to each row
• And the sum of contact hours relating to each row

Terms and Conditions of Use:

This new Institution Coverage export will increase the utility of the data being displayed on the enhanced Institution Record Coverage tab, and at the point of download the export is clearly marked with Terms and Conditions of use, which are as follows:

By accessing this Coverage data, you agree, as a member of HEAT, that it will be used for the purpose of strategic planning or collaborative working with other HEAT members. It will NOT be released externally or passed to any third-party or non-HEAT organisations. It will NOT be used for the purpose of competition or to make definitive statements about the scope, coverage or efficacy of Outreach delivery by Provider, area or the UK.

Important information related to this change

This new export option has been developed to support the changes made to the Institution Record Coverage Tab and Institution Profile Report. Please see this update on this page for more information.

We are delighted to announce an updated version of the Postcode Profiler report (members only) is now available, which has been designed to improve the format of the data available on the Postcode Profiler report, increase usability, and improve user ease of locating and understanding the data contained in the Postcode Profiler.

Following the release of the new report, this new format will replace the current Postcode Profiler report as the default option when generating a report. To support with transition, the older format will be available for generating a Postcode Profiler report for up to a year following the new release, should this be required for your use.

Summary of Changes

Archived fields

Key changes included in the new Postcode Profiler report include archival of the following Postcode Profiler fields:

• POLAR3 Average Participation Rate
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1? – POLAR3 (20% most deprived/lowest participation – POLAR3)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – POLAR3)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – IMD)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – EST)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – IDACI)
• indicators in Quintile 1 or 2 – POLAR3, IMD, EST, IDACI
• POLAR4 Average Participation Rate
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1? – POLAR4 (20% most deprived/lowest participation – POLAR4)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – POLAR4)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – IMD)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – EST)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – IDACI)
• indicators in Quintile 1 or 2 – POLAR4, IMD, EST, IDACI
• The NSSEC fields (derived from LSOA11 Code)
• Is the postcode in Quintile 1 or 2? (40% most deprived/lowest participation – NS-SEC 4-7)

The archive of these fields aims to improve the user experience by reducing repetition and streamlining the volume of information derived from postcode data. Additionally, these fields have been identified for removal as they were either based on historical methods of measuring deprivation, and/or an alternative to these fields has already been provided on the database. For example, if your organisation currently uses the ‘Is the postcode in Quintile 1? – POLAR4’ field (due to be archived), this information is already available elsewhere in the ‘National Quintiles, 1 = most deprived/lowest participation – POLAR4’ field where the Quintile value = 1.

All Quintile fields for key deprivation metrics (POLAR4, TUNDRA, IMD, EST and IDACI) will remain, and Decile fields are also provided where available. This allows combinations of Quintiles or Deciles to be utilised, enabling a flexible approach that is suited to your organisation’s definitions of disadvantage. In line with the previous field updates to the Institution Profiles (aka Planning Dataset) when we undertook the migration to the Institution Record, the ‘POLAR3’ and ‘POLAR4 Average Participation Rate’ fields have been identified for removal alongside the 2011 Ns-Sec values.

Fields removed from other reports

The update archives and removes the above fields from the Postcode Profiler report and the underlying source file. The listed fields have also been removed from the following areas (members only):

• Delivery Report
• HESA Report
• Infographic Report

Important information on exporting Student and Event Programme Application data

Finally, these fields have been removed from the Geography tab of the Student record (members only), and the Indicators tab of Event Programme Applications (members only). This removal impacts the following Exports where they occur:

• All Student Exports
• Event Programme Application Exports

In order to accommodate the changes that the Office for Students (OfS) would like to be made to this report (members only), which is submitted to the OfS each year by Uni Connect Members as part of their wider monitoring return, we have made some significant changes, including adding two new sheets.

Most changes relate to the need to accommodate the focus on attainment-raising activities. In preparation for this change, all Uni Connect Members have been asked to start recording attainment raising activities under the ‘Type’ of Skills and Attainment and to use the new values in the ‘Subtype’ field to record the attainment-raising type and the ‘Content’ field to record the attainment-raising outcome(s).

Summary of changes

As part of this work, the following changes (by sheet) have been implemented:

• About sheet – updated
• Activity Delivery – two new columns added called ‘Attainment raising activity type’ (data pulls from the activity record ‘Subtype’ field if activity record ‘Type’ is Skills and Attainment) and ‘Attainment raising outcomes’ (data pulls from the activity record ‘Content’ field if activity record ‘Type’ is Skills and Attainment and only displays values which start with the word ‘Outcome’)
• Unique Learner Engagement – one new row added called ‘Total number of unique learners (UC and non-UC) who received an intensive package of outreach; displays count of students registered to 11+ contact hours of any activity and, of those, 8 or more contact hours have the ‘Type’ of Summer School, HE Subject Insight, Mentoring, Skills & Attainment or Campus Visit
• Engagement AR (this period) – new sheet to show engagement breakdown by attainment-raising activity type (only includes activities with ‘Type’ of Skills and Attainment); displays counts of learners (UC and Non-UC) in Years 7-11 attending attainment-raising activities during the monitoring period by attainment-raising type (identified using ‘Subtype’ field), year group, average contact hours and learner characteristics; also includes counts of teacher (staff) engagements and contact hours
• Outcomes AR (this period) – new sheet to show which attainment-raising activity types target which outcomes (only includes activities with ‘Type’ of Skills and Attainment); displays counts of attainment-raising activities attended by learners (UC and Non-UC) in Years 7-11 during the monitoring period by activity outcomes (identified using the ‘Content’ field)
• Description sheet – updated
• Look Ups – updated

Important information related to this report change

It is also important to note that separate work being done to move Activity totals for ‘Parents/Carers’ and ‘Staff’ numbers into the Activity Beneficiary table means that there are two columns in the Activity Delivery sheet which will now pull data from the Beneficiaries table and not from the old fields:

• Number of Parents & Carers (non-students) receiving this activity during this monitoring period
• Number of Staff development (non-students) participants receiving this activity during this monitoring period

Please see this update on this page for more information.

This important change transfers Total Staff and Total Parent/Carer counts from the overall Activity record (members only) to each Activity beneficiary. It was proposed and approved by the Database Development Panel (DDP) with the purpose to improve reporting and data accuracy.

We recognise that this is a significant shift in data entry processes, which is why we have contacted each organisation’s Point of Contact to discuss the migration of this data. As of Summer 2024, the recording of Staff and Parent/Carer counts will need to be added accordingly to each institution added as a beneficiary to the Activity record.

When importing this information via an Activity Import Template (members only), Staff and Parent Carer counts should be included on the Beneficiary sheet. It is no longer possible to update these fields via the Activities sheet.

API users should also note that if you are updating the ‘Total Staff’ or ‘Total Parents’ fields on the main Activity record via the API, it is no longer possible to make these changes after deployment. Going forward, these values are set at a Beneficiary level and these fields have been added to the appropriate API endpoints (and UI and imports). Any adding or updating of ‘Total Staff’ or ‘Total Parents’ data via the API will not break your code. However, these fields will fail to update unless set at Beneficiary level herein.

Important information related to this change

It is also important to note that separate work being done to the Office for Students Monitoring report is also affected by this move of Activity totals for ‘Parents/Carers’ and ‘Staff’ numbers into the Activity Beneficiary table. Please see this update on this page for more information.

We are delighted to announce brand new Quick Filters have been added to the landing page of File Store (members only), and can be found below the search bar under a new name: HEAT Resources. When selected, these filters allow members to search for a specific type of resource uploaded to File Store by the HEAT team.

These changes have been made as part of the Communications and Resources project, and we hope they are useful in finding and accessing HEAT Evidence, User Guides and Videos with ease.

Full list of changes:

• The overall name of these group of filters has changed from “Quick filters” to “HEAT Resources”
• The Quick Filter name for files/resources/documents uploaded by the HEAT team has changed from “HEAT Files” to “All”
• The Quick Filter “Videos” has been added, which will in time flag any File Store entry that has an associated video
• The Quick Filter “Shared by a member” has been removed
• The Quick Filter “Resource” has been removed