UCAS - UCAS Data for HESA

What is UCAS Data for HESA?

UCAS Data for HESA (also known as *J) is the transaction which has been designed to supply data available from UCAS to institutions, in an appropriate format, so that it can be used in their HESA Student Record return.

There are a number of fields included in the transaction, and a specification is available which describes the fields that will be included, as well as any translations from UCAS to HESA coding.

The HESA data requirement is published as part of the coding manual and will be made available from their website - see assistance information below.

Higher education institutions' access to UCAS Data for HESA transaction

Higher education institutions will be able to obtain this transaction from UCAS through a number of routes:

(a) A flat-file type structure

(b) odbc-link directly into tables

The following documents give details of the format for the 'FLAT' file for *J data from HESA.

Timing for UCAS Data for HESA transaction

The UCAS Data for HESA transaction will be available at the end of an application cycle, once examination results have been confirmed; this is usually mid to late November.

Structure of the UCAS Data for HESA transaction

The structure of the transaction is one record per accepted student.

The transaction cannot be split into an entity structure. To give an example of this, and as a starting point for institutions, course-related information is provided assigned to each student according to course applied for and qualifications are provided as a repeating group of fields.

Students covered in the UCAS Data for HESA transaction

Students included in the transaction are those placed in an application cycle for a given year. Deferred students will be included in the transaction of their year of application, and will continue for every year that they are a live applicant.

Changes to the UCAS Data for HESA transaction 2012/13

The codes in fields SBJQA1, SBJQA2 and SBJQA3 will now be JACS3 compliant.

The ethnicity coding frame used in field ETHNIC has been amended to reflect new ethnicity values introduced in the 2010 Census.

The derivation of the QUALENT3 and the P91 Rule has been changed to take into account multiple Level 3 qualifications declared by the applicant as part of the Application process and not collected through ABL. Code P91 (Mixed Level 3 qualifications of which some or all are subject to UCAS Tariff) has been removed and been replaced by codes P93 (Mixed Level 3 qualifications of which all are subject to UCAS Tariff) and P94 (Mixed Level 3 qualifications of which some are subject to UCAS Tariff).

The following new fields have been added to the UCAS Data for HESA Transaction for purely information purposes. These fields do not have to be submitted to HESA:

HIQA - This field will represent the Highest Qualification an applicant has declared they have attained as entered in Apply. It uses the same coding frame as the field QUALENT3.
HIQE - This field will represent the Highest Qualification and applicant has declared they are expecting as entered in Apply. It uses the same coding frame as the field QUALENT3.

These fields have been included to help provide a fuller picture of an applicant's qualification record to aid HEIs in the coding QUALENT3.

Assistance with UCAS Data for HESA

If you require any assistance or information in regards to the 2012 entry return, please refer to the HESA website where you will find information on the 2012/13 Student return.

If you require any reference material in regards to 2011 entry, please refer to the document below. Please note that this document should only be used for reference purposes for the HESA student return made in 2011 entry.

Specification of the UCAS data for HESA (*J) 2011/12

Further information

For further information about HESA and the Student Record return, you may find it beneficial to visit the HESA website.

For a list of Previous Institution PREVINST Codes please click the below link.

UCAS member institutions: PREVINST Codes (You will need to be logged in to access this file.)

Non-UCAS member institutions: PREVINST Codes (Please note: this file only includes those schools where the PREVINST Code is based off of the UCAS School Code.)