Canonical glossary
Every term, defined once
153 terms from across FE funding, MIS, the ILR, performance and audit. Each one has a permanent page, so you can send somebody a link instead of an explanation.
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Financial support paid to students to help them stay in education, distinct from the funding that pays for their teaching.
A
Whether guidance can actually be used by the people who need it, including those using assistive technology.
The proportion of a cohort that achieved their aim.
The date the learner actually completed or left the aim.
The funding stream for regulated learning aimed at adults aged 19 and over.
A loan available to adults to pay the fees for eligible qualifications, repaid by the learner rather than funded through an allocation.
The field that says what role an aim plays: a programme aim, a component of a programme, or a standalone aim.
The amount of funding a provider is told it may earn or receive for a stream in a funding year.
A job with training, where the apprentice works for an employer and follows an approved standard leading to end-point assessment.
Apprenticeship financial record
The ILR record that carries the financial detail of an apprenticeship, including the negotiated price and any employer payments.
The charge on larger employers, the funds from which they use to pay for apprenticeship training.
The service where employers manage their apprenticeships, approve them and release funds to providers.
The approved description of what an apprentice in a particular occupation must know and be able to do, with its own assessment plan and funding band.
An adjustment to 16 to 19 funding reflecting higher delivery costs in some parts of the country.
The record of how data reached its current state, including who changed it, when and why.
The body that designs, assesses and awards a qualification.
B
The reporting through which governors gain confidence that funding is correctly earned and evidenced.
A pause in an apprenticeship or programme where the learner is expected to return, recorded as a temporary withdrawal rather than a withdrawal.
C
The discipline of controlling, recording and authorising changes to reported data.
The recovery of funding that was paid but not properly earned or not properly evidenced.
Learning where public funding meets part of the cost and the learner or employer contributes the rest.
The arrangement where an employer without sufficient levy funds pays a share of the training cost and government pays the rest.
The group of aims or learners a performance measure is calculated across.
One month of the funding year for which an ILR return is made.
A group of local authorities working together, some of which hold devolved responsibility for adult skills funding in their area.
The share of apprenticeship funding held back and paid when the apprentice completes.
The field that says whether a learner is continuing, has completed, has withdrawn, or has temporarily withdrawn.
A qualification or unit delivered as part of a programme, recorded beneath the programme aim.
The requirement that students without a qualifying grade in English or maths continue to study those subjects.
Deciding what will be taught, to whom, for how long, and with what staffing.
D
The published schedule of ILR collection periods and their deadlines for a funding year.
How accurately the recorded data reflects what actually happened.
A report that highlights records which look unusual and warrant investigation, without asserting that they are wrong.
A tool providers use to run data-quality queries over their own ILR before anyone else does.
The postcode of the place where the learning is actually delivered.
The ILR record of what a learner went on to do after their learning.
The transfer of adult skills funding responsibility from national government to combined and strategic authorities.
DfEDepartment for Education
The government department responsible for education and skills policy and funding in England.
Additional 16 to 19 funding reflecting the deprivation of students' home areas and their prior attainment.
E
The funding generated by delivery as recorded in the ILR, accrued as the year progresses.
EEPEmployability, enrichment and pastoral
The category of planned activity for 16 to 19 students that supports their programme without being qualification hours.
EHC planEducation, Health and Care plan
A legal document describing a young person's special educational needs and the provision required to meet them.
Whether a learner may be funded at all, given their age, residency, circumstances and prior learning.
The process of registering a learner onto their programme and capturing the data that funding depends on.
EPAEnd-point assessment
The independent assessment at the end of an apprenticeship that determines whether the apprentice has met the standard.
Whether a validation failure rejects the record or only warns about it.
ESFAEducation and Skills Funding Agency
The agency that historically administered further education funding, allocations and assurance on behalf of the Department for Education.
ESOLEnglish for speakers of other languages
Provision that teaches English to adults whose first language is not English.
The records that demonstrate a funded activity genuinely happened as recorded.
F
FAMFunding and monitoring
The general term for the paired type-and-code records that carry funding, eligibility and monitoring information in the ILR.
The public service for looking up learning aims and their funding attributes.
FISFunding Information System
The desktop tool providers use to validate an ILR file and produce funding reports locally before submitting.
Free meals in further education
Support providing a meal to eligible disadvantaged students in further education.
A measure that converts part-time study into an equivalent share of a full-time programme for funding purposes.
Learning for which the funding body meets the whole cost, with no fee charged to the learner.
Qualifications in English, maths and digital skills designed for practical application.
An independent examination of whether funding claimed was properly earned and can be evidenced.
The band a 16 to 19 student falls into based on their planned hours, which determines the national funding rate for them.
The cap on the price that may be funded for a given apprenticeship standard.
The formal statement a provider makes of what it has delivered and expects to be funded for, at defined points in the year.
The projection of what a college expects to earn for the rest of the funding year.
A picture of every funding stream a college receives, how each is earned and what each depends on.
The ILR field that determines which funding rules and which calculation apply to a learning delivery.
A report issued to providers that monitors specific funding risks in submitted data and asks for them to be investigated and explained.
A report produced from a submitted or validated ILR showing what the data earns and how it was calculated.
The official document setting out what may be funded, for whom, on what conditions and with what evidence, for one stream and funding year.
The year that funding rules, rates and the ILR specification are set for, running from 1 August to 31 July.
G
The point at which the employer and provider agree an apprentice is ready for end-point assessment.
GLHGuided learning hours
The hours of teaching, supervision and assessment attributed to a qualification.
The website on which official government guidance, including funding rules and rates, is published.
A request for additional funding where delivery is running above the allocation.
H
The point after which a funding year's data can no longer be amended.
Additional funding for students with significant special educational needs or disabilities, built from place funding and local authority top-up.
The learner's home address postcode, which for adult skills determines which funding authority is responsible for them.
I
IfATEInstitute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education
The body that approved apprenticeship standards, assessment plans and technical qualifications, with functions since moving to Skills England.
ILRIndividualised Learner Record
The data return in which a provider records every funded learner and every learning aim they deliver, and the basis on which funding is calculated and performance measured.
The technical definition of the ILR for a funding year: every field, its format, and its valid values.
The file format in which the ILR is submitted.
A learner recorded as currently studying an aim that has not ended.
The substantial employer placement that forms part of a T Level.
L
Funding for a year that is calculated from data returned in an earlier year.
LARSLearning Aim Reference Service
The database of learning aims and their funding attributes.
LDMLearning delivery monitoring
A funding and monitoring type used to flag local or policy-specific characteristics of an aim.
The ILR record that describes one person: their identifiers, demographics and circumstances for the funding year.
The ILR record of a learner's employment circumstances at a point in time, used for eligibility and for apprenticeships.
Learner funding and monitoring
Records held against the learner that carry eligibility, entitlement and circumstance information used by the funding calculation.
The sequence from enquiry and enrolment through delivery to completion, and the data each step creates.
The provider's own identifier for a learner within a funding year, used to link the learner between the source system and the ILR.
The code that identifies which qualification or aim is being delivered, looked up on the learning aims database.
The ILR record for one learning aim a learner is doing: what it is, when it runs, how it is funded and how it ends.
Learning delivery funding and monitoring
Records held against a single aim that carry funding, eligibility, support and monitoring information for that aim.
The date the learner actually started the aim, which fixes which funding year and which rules apply to it.
Funding for the additional support a learner needs to take part in and complete their programme.
An adult's statutory right to fully funded learning in defined circumstances.
LRSLearning Records Service
The service that issues and maintains Unique Learner Numbers and personal learning records.
M
The reporting a college uses to run itself, distinct from the statutory returns it must make.
The thresholds below which achievement rates trigger intervention.
MISManagement information systems
The team and the systems responsible for the college's data, including generating and submitting the ILR.
N
The per-student rate attached to a 16 to 19 funding band for a funding year.
The price the employer and provider agree for an apprenticeship, recorded in both the ILR and the apprenticeship service.
O
Training an apprentice receives during working hours that is not part of their normal day-to-day duties.
The regulator of qualifications and examinations in England.
The inspectorate for education and skills provision in England.
The field that records what the learner achieved on an aim.
P
The proportion of learners who stayed to the end and achieved their aim.
The record of a learner's achievements held against their ULN by the Learning Records Service.
The date the aim was expected to finish when it started.
The total hours of planned, timetabled, education-related activity for a 16 to 19 student in the year, which determines their funding band.
The highest level of qualification a learner already holds, which affects eligibility and entitlement in several funding streams.
The aim that represents the whole programme a learner is enrolled on, with the component aims recorded beneath it.
The element of the 16 to 19 formula that reflects the relative cost of delivering different subject areas.
A student record system used by many further education colleges and training providers.
Optional ILR fields a provider can use for its own monitoring purposes.
The official guidance explaining how to complete each ILR field for a funding year.
Q
QARQualification achievement rate
The published measure of how many learners achieved the qualifications they were expected to complete.
The position of a qualification on the regulated qualifications framework, from entry level upwards.
The minimum period a learner must remain on an aim before funding is generated for it.
R
The fourth ILR return of the funding year, closing in early December, and the return that carries the student numbers used in the following year's 16 to 19 allocation.
The tenth ILR return of the funding year, closing in early June, commonly used as the reference point for year-end funding claims and growth conversations.
The final ILR return of the funding year and the last opportunity to amend that year's data.
The official document setting out the funding rates and the calculation for a stream and funding year.
The process of comparing what was delivered and earned against what was allocated, and settling the difference.
A date on which a count or a position is taken, used in allocation and funding calculations.
A qualification approved by the qualifications regulator and offered by a recognised awarding organisation.
The requirement that a learner has been resident in the relevant area for a qualifying period and has a status allowing them to be funded.
A learner resuming an aim after a break in learning, recorded so the system understands it is a continuation rather than a new start.
Submitting a corrected ILR file within the same collection window after an earlier submission.
The element of the 16 to 19 formula that reflects how many students completed their main aim.
The proportion of a cohort that stayed to the end of their aim.
One submission of the ILR for a collection period, made by a published deadline.
The internal confirmation, before a return is submitted, that the data is correct and the funding it generates is expected.
A measurable signal that funding or data quality may be going wrong.
S
Selecting a subset of records for testing, from which conclusions are drawn about the whole population.
A short, employer-linked adult training course funded against delivery and outcome milestones.
The body set up to take on national responsibility for skills, including apprenticeships and technical education functions.
The funding and monitoring code that records which body is funding an aim, including whether it is national or devolved.
The system in which a college records learners, enrolments and outcomes, and from which the ILR is generated.
The coherent programme of learning a 16 to 19 student follows, made up of qualifications and other planned activity.
Arranging for another organisation to deliver learning that the lead provider remains accountable for.
The service providers use to submit ILR files and to access validation output and funding reports.
T
A two-year technical programme for 16 to 19 students, including a substantial industry placement.
Non-formula-funded adult provision, previously community learning and non-regulated learning, with its own funding model and allocation.
Achievement within the expected time for the aim, rather than after an extension.
The margin by which delivery may fall short of an allocation without the funding being reduced.
TQTTotal qualification time
Guided learning hours plus the estimated time a learner spends studying independently.
A student record system used by many further education colleges.
U
UKPRNUK Provider Reference Number
The eight-digit number that identifies a learning provider across every funding and data system.
UKRLPUK Register of Learning Providers
The register that holds provider identity information and issues the UKPRN.
ULNUnique Learner Number
The ten-digit number that identifies a learner across providers and across years.
V
The report listing every validation rule failure in a submitted or locally validated ILR file.
A published check applied to an ILR record, which the record must pass before it can be accepted and funded.
W
A learner leaving an aim before completing it, recorded with an actual end date, a withdrawal completion status and a reason.
The code that records why a learner left, recorded alongside a withdrawal.