Common use of HESA performance indicators Clause in Contracts

HESA performance indicators. The University has selected targets that can be monitored consistently over time and for which benchmarking information is available, to enable evaluation of our performance in context. Table 7a of Annex B to this Access Agreement sets out our targets for HESA performance indicators, focusing on successful recruitment and retention of key widening participation groups. In our Access Agreements since 2012/13 we have focused on recruitment and retention of students from low participation neighbourhoods, after taking advice from UCAS and HESA about the reliability of data on different indicators of widening participation. This focus on low participation neighbourhoods is helpful, enabling us to selectively target our outreach activities on schools, colleges and other organisations with catchment areas including these priority neighbourhoods. We have included targets on retention, although our performance is already better than benchmark. This is due to concerns that widening participation students may be more likely than other students to withdraw in their first year of study. We continue to keep these performance indicators under close scrutiny. Our targets are based on POLAR3 classification.