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DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
HIGHER EDUCATION MANAGEMENT
INFORMATION SYSTEM
CIRCULAR 6: October 2006
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2. New qualification code for
three yr Professional First Bachelors degrees 3. Reporting of student outputs
in second HEMIS submission 4. Further consideration of the
definition of “active student” 5. Course census day files 6. Use of year n graduates for
calculating course credit values 7. Reporting of NSFAS status and
SA ID numbers 8. Audit guidelines –
registration forms 9. New
elements 074, 075, 076 and 077 |
The
document on Foundation provision (Funding for Foundational Provision in
formally approved programmes 2007/8 to 2009/10)
refers:
1.1 Any
person enrolled in an extended curriculum programme for foundation funding
purposes must be reported in HEMIS as a student only if he/she satisfies
these conditions:
·
He/she
must be in possession of either a senior certificate with endorsement or
certificate of exemption, or a senior certificate without endorsement, or be
admitted at Senate’s discretion.
·
He/she
must be registered for the relevant Ministerially approved
undergraduate qualification. Their
primary registration must not be that of “occasional” or “non-degree” students
or of “bridging programme” students.
·
He/she
must have been active in that course on and before the census day prescribed by
the institution.
1.2 An extended curriculum
programme must be one of the Institution’s formal (i.e. Ministerially approved) undergraduate programmes in
which substantial foundational provision, which is additional to the coursework
prescribed for the regular curriculum, is incorporated. Even though an extended curriculum programme
requires additional provision and study time, the total of the HEMIS credit
values assigned to the extended programme must not exceed the Ministerially approved credit total for the relevant
regular programme.
From 2006 all Professional First Bachelors
degrees with an approved total time of three years must be coded 33 for
Element 005 (Qualification Type). This
is to ensure that the correct weighting is generated for these qualifications
in the teaching outputs of the new funding formula. The revised as well as the
old list of codes for element 005 is attached.
Circular
5 states:
“The Department gives notice that it will require institutions to
submit, from the 2006 reporting year, full output data in their second
submissions (in this case March 2007), and that funding sanctions will be
imposed on those institutions who do not comply with this directive.”
The
Department is still not able to produce a full picture of the student outputs
of the system for any year until September of the following year. This is not
satisfactory, as far as national planning and funding analyses are concerned. The DoE will however not impose funding
sanctions but has instead decided to extend the submission date for the 2nd
student submission to the 30th April unless otherwise stated in the
letter “SUBMISSION DATES FOR INFORMATION REQUIRED FOR THE YEAR XXXX IN TERMS OF
THE HIGHER EDUCATION ACT” which is sent to all Vice Chancellors at the
beginning of each.
4.1 The current directives can be summed up
in this way:
A student may be left on the census day file
of a course only if the institution has evidence that the student was active
during the period before census day. The nature of this evidence is left to the
discretion of the institution’s external auditor, but could include any one of the
following: the student (a) had submitted course assignments, or (b) attended
lectures, seminars, tutorials or practicals, or (c)
had written class tests, or (d) had raised study queries with an academic staff
member, or (d) had made use of a learning center. What would not be acceptable
as sole evidence of activity is the writing of the final examinations in a
course.
4.2 The Department noted in
circular 5:
·
that
the directive must be made stronger, particularly in relation to distance
education programmes, and
·
that its application should not be left to
the discretion of external auditors.
·
The
Department gives notice to institutions that a new directive, which will take
account of quality assurance strategies being developed by the HEQC, is under
consideration. The new directive would apply from the 2007 academic year and
institutions will be informed accordingly upon Ministerial approval of the new
distance education policy.
4.3
Proof
of Activity
4.3.1 The Department has considered the wording in
the current directives “…active during the period before census day” and
gives notice that it will accept proof activity after the census date provided
that the student is registered on census date and the proof of activity is
before the final examination and the activity is one of the transactions listed
in 4.1 above. What would not be
acceptable as proof of activity is merely some form of administrative process
such as a financial transaction, change of address, etc, the activity must be a
teaching or learning related activity.
5.1 The Department of Education is going to
change the determination of the census date in the light of the accepting proof
of activity before and after the census date.
5.2 In
Circular 5 Institutions were asked to note that the census day file of a course
cannot be treated as a “snapshot” which is not subject to later change and
amendment. Census day files can and must be amended to take account, for
example, of back-dated registrations and back-dated course cancellations.
5.3 The HEMIS glossary enables an
Institution to determine the course census as follows:
The course census
date lies within a set period:
the start date for the set period is
first teaching day for the course plus 1/3 of the number of teaching days in
the course, and
the end date for the
set period is the first teaching day for the course plus 2/3 of the number of
teaching days in the course.
5.4 In the
light of the decision in 4.3.1 the Department requires that the census date now
be determined as the midpoint of the academic period for a course. The start date for the set period is the
first teaching day for the course and the end date the last teaching day before
the examination. The start date for the
set period must not be that of the date of registration.
6. USE OF YEAR N GRADUATES FOR CALCULATING
CREDIT VALUES
The Department is giving notice that as it is
compulsory to submit a 3rd submission of student data, institutions
may for this submission use the graduates of year n to calculate credit values
for non-research courses provided that it will not delay the submission. Similarly for the calculation of the credit
values for research curricula the average for the years
n, n-1 and n-2 may be used provided that it will not delay the submission.
7. REPORTING OF NSFAS STATUS AND SA ID
NUMBERS.
7.1 NSFAS data: Some
Institutions are still submitting submissions with incomplete data on the NSFAS
status of students. This information is
important for planning purposes and submissions will therefore be returned to
the institution for completion.
7.2 SA ID numbers: This information is of critical importance for
the cohort studies. If not reported
correctly students will be treated as drop-outs in the cohort studies if they
cannot be tracked on their ID numbers.
Additional validations are being built into Valpac
to check the validity of the SA ID numbers submitted for a student record.
8. AUDIT GUIDELINES – REGISTRATION FORMS
The Department realizes that it is not always
possible to keep the hard copies of registration forms due to space
constraints. Notice is therefore being
given that the Department will accept for audit purposes proof of registration
a scanned electronic version of the signed registration form. However, the format of this scanned document
must be such that alterations and additions are not permissible.
9. NEW ELEMENTS 074, 075, 076 and 077
Institutions were requested to report on the
abovementioned elements in 2007. The
Department realizes that these elements will need a phased in approach and
therefore gives notice that this information will be applicable at this stage
only to first time entering undergraduate students coming in from the school or
FET system and who are South African citizens.
The validation in Valpac will therefore take
this into account.
Praxis computing has been working on lookup tables
for the centre (school) number and name and the examination centre for the Valpac and Hemis software. They have however found that data provided
from the EMIS and FET system contains duplicates and additional time will be
required to fix these problems. The
Department therefore gives notice that institutions will only be required now
to report substantive data in 2008.
These elements therefore will only be tested under the validation rules
from 2008.