This NFER report investigates whether existing data could help construct useful, supportive information for schools and colleges based on the longer-term destinations of former students.
One of education’s many roles is to provide young people with the knowledge, skills and behaviours required to support their progression to further study, training and employment. However, the main focus of schools and colleges has historically been on short term attainment outcomes and less on long term specific measures of future labour market success.
While these offer snapshots of a moment in time, they also provide an incomplete and therefore potentially misleading picture. A key purpose of education is to set young people on a path to success in work and in life. But how this looks depends on a number of factors, ranging from their personal attainment scores to their future earnings and even socio-economic background.
This independent and in-depth analysis of the LEO dataset to understand how the data can be improved and used to construct helpful and supportive information for schools and colleges about the longer term destinations of their former students.
Context is crucial for understanding and interpreting destination measures.