Continuous Improvement of the National Schools Statistics Collection

The ABS has been working with education departments in several jurisdictions in a successful trial to transition the data provision for the National Schools Statistics Collection (NSSC) from student aggregate data to de-identified unit record level (URL) student enrolment data. To date, the trials have involved government schools administration data.

The results of this work are very encouraging and show that the URL data can be used to continue to produce the NSSC without a break in time series. Transitioning to URL data will enable several improvements to the NSSC, including enhancements to the information made available to users and incorporating standardised processing practices across jurisdictions resulting in a valuable source of nationally comparable data on schools statistics. This level of data will also assist in improving understanding of patterns of student movement across educational jurisdictions and sectors, as patterns of progress through schooling.

The Schools team has also engaged people from the resource departments of the various data providers to discuss ways to improve the NSSC staffing data. It is anticipated that through this work the NSSC staffing data will continue to be able to be used by existing stakeholders for their ongoing purposes, while also increasing the relevance of the staffing data to a broader range of stakeholders. One goal is to better identify teaching and non-teaching staff.

The data published through the National Schools Statistics Collection can be found in Schools, Australia, 2010 (cat. no. 4221.0).

For more information, contact Information Consultancy on 1300 135 070 or email education.statistics@abs.gov.au