Report on Widening Access Consultation Report

13. Respondents were also invited to share general feedback on the publication to-date. This helps SFC gather intelligence on the elements of the Report on Widening Access that are valued and should be retained, and any areas which could be improved or added that were not captured elsewhere in the consultation.

What do you value in the Report on Widening Access currently?

14. Respondents say the publication is a trusted, reliable and accurate source that people feel confident referencing. It is important that SFC maintains trust and accuracy in the RoWA as it developed following the consultation.
15. Stakeholders value the ability to benchmark institutions against other providers as well as seeing the Scottish sector-level context. One institution mentioned that this allows them to interpret their own figures and identify progress they are making. The institutional breakdowns in the CoWA tables will remain as the publication is developed.
16. Feedback also provided useful evidence that the publication is used widely across institutions and teams for various purposes, such as:
    • Internal planning and target-setting within institutions.
    • To inform sector policy discussions.
    • To support discussions with SFC under the Outcomes Framework and Assurance Model (OFAM).

17. One of the most consistent messages was the value of the RoWA providing longitudinal reporting. This supports strategic planning, senior leadership briefing, and avoiding overreaction to year‑on‑year volatility. Following feedback gauging interest in limiting reporting to a 10-year time series, SFC will limit tables and visualisations to 10 years with the exception of the CoWA tables, where a longitudinal view of more than a decade is vital to see progress before and after the launch of the CoWA targets in 2016.^[9]
18. Respondents also value the RoWA providing coverage of students beyond entry. The inclusion of retention, university qualifiers, college student outcomes, graduate outcomes destinations and college leaver destinations measures broaden the widening access narrative from ‘getting in’ to ‘getting through and beyond’. SFC is planning to launch a new student journeys publication later in 2026, which will examine journeys through and out of education in more detail. Decisions about which measures of student progress and outcomes remain in RoWA and which will be moved to the new publication will be made once the scope of the new publication is further refined.
19. Respondents frequently mentioned the value of breakdowns for widening access groups such as SIMD0-20, care experienced and disabled students, and the ability to compare these groups with the wider population. SFC will retain this ability when the publication is developed.
20. A distinctive strength people value is that the RoWA covers both colleges and universities plus articulation between the two, offering a tertiary system view. Articulation pathways were singled out as particularly important for some stakeholders, with a clear message that this should remain visible and not be deprioritised.
21. SFC also received positive feedback from respondents valuing the length of the main report for its brevity and use of charts and tables to highlight key trends quickly.

What parts of it would you like to see improved or enhanced?

22. A very strong theme from respondents was that the background tables are rich in data but hard to navigate, with users describing the formatting as dense and sometimes difficult to compare figures. Users also suggested improving navigation and findability of figures by using clearer headings and a thematic structure. SFC are keen to improve the publication in this area by launching a RoWA Power BI dashboard which will address many of these issues.
23. Multiple responses caveated that even with a dashboard, it is important to have simple download options so that teams can extract the data and share internally. We will carefully consider this feedback and continue publishing Excel tables if we cannot provide this functionality through the dashboard.
24. Respondents would also like to see more intersectionality across protected characteristics and SIMD. Currently the RoWA is mostly limited to single-factor breakdowns. For some respondents this was the highest priority for improvement. This is something SFC are also keen to address in the design of the upcoming Power BI dashboard. Dashboards are better suited to this sort of interactive analysis and data reporting than Excel tables.
25. Another strong recurring theme was the importance of highlighting the role of the college sector and keeping the ‘tertiary’ or ‘whole journey’ story central. Users mentioned their interest in seeing greater granularity of college student outcomes, articulation and college leavers destinations. We will carefully consider this feedback. In some cases, it may be more appropriate to signpost users to other publications for this information.
26. A recurring ask was for more clarity on student population definitions, for instance ‘first degree student’ and ‘other undergraduate’. Users also wish for consistency of definitions between SFC and HESA where possible, with explanations and caveats of where they differ. Ongoing improvements to the publication have been made in this area in recent years, with population groups more fully explained and SFC aligning its definition of Scottish domiciled full-time first-degree entrants and qualifiers with that used by HESA in their Open Data reporting. Work will continue in this area as we develop the publication over the coming years.
27. There were many responses asking to strengthen university retention measures beyond those entering year 1 retained into year 2 of a first degree.^[10] Feedback also included more meaningful journey measures that recognise non-linear and flexible study paths such as pauses, part-time patters and credit accumulation. Several also note that leaving before graduation can be a positive outcome for an individual (e.g. entering new employment), and that the narrative should better reflect that complexity. SFC is working towards launching a learner journeys publication later this year which will address some of these gaps in analysis. SFC have developed a new record matching algorithm which will enable us to better track students in their student journey. This will enable SFC to remove reliance on HESA’s non-continuation calculation, which is where current retention statistics are derived from and are no longer published for the UK overall.
28. Many highlighted the time lag between data collection and publication. SFC has developed a matching process so that it is no longer reliant on HESA producing the non-continuation calculation for us, which can lead to delays. Delays in receiving HESA data after the transition to Data Futures and the additional quality assurance checking that was required in developing the National Articulation Database (NAD) from this has caused delays in the past but should be less of an issue in future, especially if progression data are moved to the new student journeys publication.
29. Users also requested stronger narrative interpretation and contextual commentary. This is an area SFC has developed in recent years, with clearer ‘so what’ interpretation. There is a balance here between maintaining the brevity of the main report and providing full context and interpretation.

Is there anything you would like to see added?

30. Many respondents were keen to see data that highlights the role of colleges in widening access across entry, progression, and outcomes, not just university entrants. This is included in the RoWA but could be better signposted and further developed. There was also strong interest in college routes into university and to include articulation reporting beyond advance standing. Users also suggested clearer visibility of SWAP and other access routes.
31. Multiple responses asked for stronger ‘pipeline’ context incorporating school pupil attainment and comparator data. SFC does not currently hold school pupil or school leaver data. The development of the student journeys publication may provide a suitable avenue for exploring the addition of analysis on this topic.
32. Users also reported wanting to see more subject-level breakdowns cross-referenced with protected characteristics. This is currently provided in the RoWA using SIMD, ethnicity and disability for university students, but could be explored as part of the RoWA dashboard development.
33. Several respondents would like to see reporting on postgraduate taught students. This is not currently under consideration but may be incorporated in due course into the new student journeys publication.
34. There were also strong calls to report on Graduate Apprenticeship students and where possible, Modern Apprenticeship students. This is something SFC are keen to develop into the RoWA.

What parts of it do you find less useful or could be removed?

35. Most respondents would remove little or nothing. A strong through-line was that the RoWA is broadly valuable as-is, with several comments emphasising that the current data is ‘very valuable’ and should not be reduced in a way that harms accessibility or transparency.
36. The consultation proposed changes to remove the HESA PI Table and Background Table 12 (HESA Staff data) from the publication, which received strong support.

^[9] See ‘A Blueprint for Fairness: Final Report of the Commission on Widening Access’: https://www.gov.scot/publications/blueprint-fairness-final-report-commission-widening-access/

^[10] Articulating students entering directly into year 2 or 3 are captured in this data. This is because the retention metric captures those entering the first academic session and retained into their second academic session, regardless of what year of programme that might be. Students entering their first session and qualifying before the second are also counted in retention metrics.

37. Below is a list of respondents, the institution they responded from, and whether their response was given in an individual capacity or whether their response represented the views of a specific organisation.