Children, Education and Skills

Our Children, Education and Skills domain oversees the regulation of data and statistics concerning all stages of education from early years to university and beyond, including statistics on teachers and lecturers, learners, and looked after children.

Education and training, from providing the best start for young people to equipping the workforce, has a profound impact on the society, business and the economy of the countries of the UK. High quality statistics and data to support effective decision making and evaluate policy implementation are crucial.

Our priorities reflect areas of public interest, both in terms of the use of statistics and where there have been recent policy changes.

As a result of COVID-19 and the concerns around the models used to award grades across the four nations this year, we undertook a Review into the approach taken to developing statistical models designed for awarding 2020 exam results. We published our report in March 2021. We are working with others to communicate our findings and ensure that our recommendations are implemented.

We have carried out rapid reviews of attendance at educational settings statistics during the coronavirus pandemic and compliance checks of the Higher Education Statistics Agency’s new Graduate Outcomes Survey and Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA) ensuring that education statistics are of high quality and continue to meet users’ needs. We responded to the Royal Statistical Society about their concerns around the statistical elements of the Teaching Excellence Framework. We are continuing our review of Children and Young People statistics. Later in the year we plan to carry out an assessment of Key Stage 4 statistics produced by the Department for Education.

We advocate the use of new technologies by producers, such as the Department for Education’s move to the Explore Education Statistics platform and continue to encourage data access through the Secure Research Service. We will further consider what society’s key questions are in this area and support producers in answering them.

Contact our regulators for this domain Emily Carless, Nisha Bunting, Emma Harrison and Michelle Alderson, for more information.

Planned Work

Published Correspondence – Children, Education and Skills domain

Publications – Children, Education and Skills domain