College Staffing Return Guidance 2023-24

2. This document contains guidance notes for completing the aggregate Staffing Return for academic year 2023-24.

3. The data is to be based on number of employees who are being paid by the college, rather than the number of jobs / posts.
4. There are two sections for completion – one for headcount and another for full-time equivalents (FTEs).
5. An error checker is available in the top right-hand corner of each sheet and has been set-up to detect possible errors in data entry. An error will highlight the cells in question which colleges can then check and amend accordingly.
6. A downloadable Excel file for completion is available from the SFC website. The deadline for returning the data is Friday 4 October 2024.
7. All tables must be completed, otherwise the return will not be accepted and returned.
8. Please address any queries or correspondence relating to the collection to Michelle McNeill (contact details are listed on this page).

9. Data (both headcount and FTE) should be returned for all college payroll staff employed for at least 10% FTE at some point in the academic session (1 August 2023 to 31 July 2024).

Colleges should include:

• Employees on secondment or loan ONLY if the college is paying for the majority (50% or more) or all of their wages. If costs are split equally, the sending rather than the receiving college should count the employee. Employees seconded in from the private sector should be included if your organisation is paying for the majority or all of their wages. However, please exclude employees seconded out to the private sector.
• Employees who work only part of the year, at any point during the academic year. Where a certain person employed by the college works part of the year on more than one occasion (for example, August to October, then January to May) count them once and return in relation to their contract with the most hours.
• Employees on paid maternity / paternity leave (for the purpose of calculating FTEs, contracted hours of those on maternity / paternity leave should be those they were working before they left).
• Employees on paid sick leave or special leave.
• Employees on short-term unpaid leave (e.g. bereavement or parental leave) with FTEs calculated for the period of time during which the employee was working / paid (see Appendix 1 for details).

Colleges should exclude:

• Self-employed, contract workers and agency workers not paid directly from the payroll.

General definitions

10. Teaching Staff – ‘Teaching staff’ are defined as staff whose primary contractual responsibility is teaching and / or who spend at least 10% of their time in teaching activity. These staff may also have other responsibilities including organisation and line management (e.g. Head of Department etc.). A member of staff whose main activity is teaching but does not hold a contract as a lecturer and above should be returned as an ‘Instructor or equivalent,’ only if they spend at least 10% of their time in teaching activity. INCLUDE trainers and workplace assessors as teaching staff if involved in the direct provision of learning related to a student course / programme for at least 10% of their contracted time.
11. Non-Teaching (support) Staff – No staff that are defined as ‘teaching staff’ (see above) should be included in the ‘non-teaching (support)’ category.
12. All senior management / management and support staff (including technicians, administrative / clerical, estates, maintenance, research assistants and instructors, who spend less than 10% of their time in teaching activity) should be defined as
    ‘non-teaching (support)’ unless they are directly involved in teaching for at least 10% of their time.
13. Full-time – Those who work standard contracted hours, that is, the college’s normal weekly hours over the normal contracted working year.
14. Part-time – Those who work less than standard contracted hours, that is, less than the college’s normal weekly hours and / or less than the college’s normal contracted working year.
15. Permanent Staff – Staff employed on permanent contracts (not a fixed term) should be classified as permanent staff.
16. Temporary Staff – Staff employed on contracts which specify an end date (other than retirement age) or otherwise limits the duration of the contract should be classified as temporary staff.

Headcount definitions

17. Headcount – The number of staff employed in the college during the academic year (a standard working years is assumed to comprise 230 working days or about 36 working weeks. Standard contracted hours are assumed to be 35 hours per week).Each member of staff should be counted once, regardless of the amount of time for which they are employed. If a member of staff holds two unrelated contracts, they should only be counted once and returned in relation to their contract with the most hours. A member of staff on more than one successive temporary contract during the year should also be counted only once. If the terms of a member of staff’s contract changes (temporary / permanent, full-time / part-time), then record the staff member only once with the type of contract held at the end of the academic year (31 July 2023) or, for those staff who have left during the year, the type of contract on leaving.
18. Age – Age is as at 31 July 2024.
19. Sex – following the latest recommended guidance for public bodies from the Chief Statistician on the collection and publication of equalities data on Sex, this should be reported as Male, Female, Prefer not to say or Unknown.
20. Senior Management – Senior management would cover staff in senior management roles that spend less than 10% of their time in teaching activity.
21. Other Staff – Staff that spend less than 10% of their time in teaching activity and are not considered senior management.
22. Ethnic Origin – It is compulsory for colleges to collect details of ethnicity of staff. Colleges have a specific duty under the Equality Act 2010 to monitor staff recruitment and career progress by racial group. To meet this specific duty, colleges need to collect data on staff by ethnicity.
23. In addition, to meet its general duty to eliminate racial discrimination, promote equal opportunities and good relations between different groups, SFC plans to monitor staff by racial groups at a sector level. We are therefore encouraging all colleges that have returned any staff as ‘information refused / not known,’ in terms of ethnicity to take effective steps to improve the proportion of staff with meaningful codes. Please refer to Appendix 2 for definitions.
24. Salary – Salary should be recorded as the full-time equivalent salary.
25. Disability – Disability should be recorded as self-disclosed disability. It is understood that some members of staff may not disclose disability. If no disability is disclosed, the staff member should be counted as ‘No disclosed disability.’
26. Qualifications – Formal qualifications include any qualifications which are relevant or essential to the post held. See below for further details. You should put all teaching staff in one of the teaching qualification categories.
27. If a member of staff has achieved more than one level of qualification, use the highest qualification achieved (e.g. where a member of staff has a ‘Certificate: Introduction to Teaching in FE,’ and a ‘TQ Secondary,’ then count that member of staff once under ‘TQ FE, TQ Secondary, TQ Primary, PGDE (adult literacies) or Equivalent,’ as it is higher than ‘Other TQ not equivalent to TQFE/Secondary/Primary/PGDE (adult literacies’).
28. The Teaching Qualification field should reflect the highest qualification of staff at the end of the academic year (31 July 2023) or, for members of staff that have left during the year, should reflect the highest qualification on leaving.
29. TQFE, TQ Secondary, TQ Primary, PGDE (adult literacies) or Equivalent – You should include in this category teaching staff who hold:

• The TQ Further Education (FE).
• The TQ Secondary Education (SE).
• The TQ Primary Education (PE).
• The PGDE (Adult Literacies).
• Any other teaching qualification that is equivalent to the TQ (FE) according to any further guidance issued by SFC. See the Professional Learning & Development Forum (PLDF Scotland) website for more information on qualifications.

30. Other TQ not equivalent to TQFE/Secondary/Primary/ PGDE (adult literacies) – Teaching staff with a teaching qualification other than those listed above should be included in this category.
31. Other teaching qualifications currently counted as ‘Other TQ,’ include:

• Certificate: Introduction to Teaching Further Education.
• Advanced Certificate: Teaching in Further Education.
• Diploma: Teaching in Further Education.
• Advanced Diploma: Introduction to Teaching in Further Education.
• Advanced Diploma: Teaching in Further Education.
• ESOL Literacy: Teaching Adults Reading, Writing and Numeracy.
• Advanced Diploma: Quality Improvement.
• Advanced Diploma: Teaching Children and Young People.
• TEFL, DELTA/CELTA, Diploma/Certificate in TESOL.
• Assessor or Verifier Awards.
• L & D qualifications/PDA in assessment and verification.
• City and Guilds teaching qualifications.
• Other qualifications for skills trainers and assessors.

32. Formal Qualification but not Teacher Trained – The normal entry requirements for a TQFE are specified by the Scottish Government and more information can be found at Professional Learning & Development Forum (PLDF Scotland) website. Teaching staff that do not hold a TQ or equivalent but hold the minimum entry requirements to train for a TQ should be included in this category.
33. No Formal Qualification – Teaching staff who do not hold a TQ or equivalent and without the minimum entry requirements to train for a TQ (see link in above paragraph) should be classed as having no formal qualification.
34. Country of nationality – If country of nationality is not spilt i.e. Scotland, England, Wales/Cymru, N.Ireland we will accept British.

FTEs definitions

35. Number of staff (FTE) – The number of staff (FTE) should cover the number of full-time equivalent staff employed by the college. Contracted hours should be used as the basis for calculating FTEs. A full-time member of staff employed for the year would normally have an FTE of 1 (but cannot be greater than 1).
36. Exclude overtime and holidays (see paragraph below).
37. Appendix 1 provides further guidance on the calculation of FTE, including various examples.
38. Overtime and holidays – Overtime and holidays should be EXCLUDED. If staff undertake regular overtime, then their contract should be amended.

Completion of the return and data validation

39. Please use the Excel file provided on the website.
40. Put the data in the white cells in the tables. The other cells in the file are protected and should not be changed. Please also do not attempt to enter any data in the shaded cells. All shaded cells are protected and will not accept data entry.
41. Please do not try to add columns or rows to the spreadsheet. The spreadsheet is protected.
42. Please insert zero (‘0’) rather than leaving a cell blank.
43. If you wish to copy data into the file from another source, highlight the cells to be copied and use the ‘paste special’/ ‘values’ option in Excel.
44. The staff headcount and FTE should agree between different tables and FTE must not be greater than headcount.
45. An error checker is located in the top right-hand corner of each sheet. This will highlight the nature and location of any errors. In addition, the error cells will be highlighted red. Please note that, on first entering data, several errors will probably appear. The number of errors should decrease as more data is entered. If there is a small amount of errors for numbers of FTEs that are; unknown/refused age/ethnicity these should be regarded as warnings, so it would be acceptable to submit the return with errors that are actually warnings. However, in such circumstances, colleges should look at ways of improving the quality of data returned. Returns must be free of all other errors.
46. Please send the completed form to datareturns@sfc.ac.uk by Friday 4 October 2024.
47. Any queries or correspondence relating to the Staffing Return Data Collection should be addressed to Michelle McNeill at the address on the front cover.

Steve McDonald
Chief Information Officer

Please note these examples are intended as a guide to working out FTE only and the standard contracted hours / working weeks given may not be appropriate to your college. If the standard hours / working weeks differ in your college then please use those to calculate your FTE.

• FTE of Teaching staff: a standard working year is assumed to comprise 201 working days or about 40 working weeks. Standard contracted hours are assumed to be 35 hours per week.
• FTE of Non-teaching (support) staff: a standard working year is assumed to comprise 230 working days or about 46 working weeks. Standard contracted hours are assumed to be 35 hours per week.

The notes in Appendix 3 apply to UHI partner colleges and SRUC.

1. Staffing data for FE activity is only mandatory for UHI partner colleges and SRUC to provide.
2. Since 2001-02, UHI partner colleges have supplied data on FE student activity only to SFC (and HE activity to HESA) and are required to do the same for their staffing data. This now also applies to SRUC.
3. Please use whichever method you find easier to identify the FE activity only but the following is a suggested guide:

• Exclude any member of staff working entirely on HE work.
• Teaching staff hours taken from staff timetables can be used to calculate a FE FTE and HE FTE for each member of staff, and then report only the FE FTE.
• For cross-college staff base the FE FTE and HE FTE on the relative volume of activity at each of these levels in the college, and again then report only the FE FTE.

4. For colleges using a different method than shown above please provide details.