Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF)

Every four years, the OfS assesses and rates providers for “excellence above a set of minimum requirements for quality and standards” (Full OfS guidance). Providers receive an overall rating that is comprised of two underpinning ratings: one for the student experience and one for student outcomes.

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This potentially equates to over 1,000 indicators for a provider, depending on their student population.

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The TEF uses two sets of data to calculate providers’ TEF ratings, one is for student experience and the other is for student outcomes. These two ratings combine into an overall rating for the provider.

• The student outcomes indicators for continuation and completion are the same as those calculated for the Condition B3 indicators and refer to students from all domiciles.

• The student outcomes indicators for progression and the student experience indicators refer to only Home domiciled students.

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The OfS calculates a series of Student Outcomes/Experience indicators for each provider. There are two key figures that providers need to note, and these are:

1. The indicator calculated by the OfS, e.g. continuation rate

2. The benchmark set by the OfS  to understand how well a provider has performed compared with performance for similar types of students on similar types of courses in the higher education sector as a whole

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Indicators

Indicators are provided by the OfS, at provider level, for each of the following stages of the student life cycle:

• Continuation rates - proportion of new entrants continuing to their second year of study

• Completion rates - proportion of new entrants completing their programme of study (using the cohort tracking method)

• Progression rates - proportion of students counted as a positive outcome in the Graduate Outcomes survey

• Student experience satisfaction rates - positive outcomes in the National Student Survey

Further (split) indicators are provided by the OfS, the details of which can be found in the OfS Description and Methodology document.

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Benchmarks

“The Office for Students (OfS) uses benchmarking to make meaningful comparisons between higher education providers, different student groups and other groups or units of interest.” (OfS benchmarking) The OfS provides a benchmark for each split indicator for each provider.