Guidance

PTQ Outcomes: Other Assessment Information

Updated 4 August 2023

Applies to England

Introduction

In order to fulfil our regulatory and accreditation functions as set out in the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009, we require awarding organisations to provide exams delivery data for regulated qualifications.

What data will be collected?

Data should relate only to vocational and technical qualifications (VTQs) that are included in the Department for Education’s performance tables (PTQs) for the academic year being submitted. More specifically, these are: Technical Awards, Applied Generals, Technical Certificates and Technical Levels.

When will data be collected?

Data will be collected according to the reporting schedule which is agreed and maintained by Ofqual’s data services team.

Updates to formats and guidance

This guidance document will be updated regularly. Any changes to procedure will be incorporated into the guidance document.

How to submit your data

Your data should be submitted to us in CSV format. Please refer to the ‘Connecting to Ofqual’s data portal and uploading data’ document on our webpage to help you submit your files to us. If you need to ask us about a data submission please do contact the Data Services team by emailing data.services@ofqual.gov.uk, please do not send your data files via email to Data Services or to any other Ofqual email address, or via Contact the Regulator in the Portal.

Uploaded data

Once files have been successfully uploaded, the data will be validated against a set of validation rules. These are detailed in the sections below. If validation is successful, the data is automatically transferred into our systems and you will receive email confirmation. If the file is unsuccessful at any stage of validation you will receive an email with details of the validation failure. Please correct your file and resubmit it.

Amendments to data

Ofqual staff will not alter data once it has been submitted. If you find an error or omission after you’ve had a successful upload, please notify us by emailing data.services@ofqual.gov.uk. We need to reject the existing submission before you can upload a new file.

How your data will be used

This data will be used to undertake our regulatory activities and, where required, to produce Official Statistics to fulfil our responsibility as a government department.

General completion guidelines

• This template is designed to capture information on assessors and materials produced by AOs for assessments taken throughout the academic year.

• Note that we are only asking for numbers of materials produced and issued by AOs. We are not asking for materials produced by centres or materials otherwise related to non-examined assessments^{[footnote 1]}

• The AssessmentCode field in this template is cross validated against AssessmentCode in other PTQ Outcomes templates.

File format

The file must be CSV format and the first row must be headers as displayed in the ‘Name’ column of the table below. The subsequent rows must have the values of the data to be reported which must match the format and validation rules below.

Name	Description	Position	Validation Regular Expression	Description of Regular Expression
ReportingDate	Date the file was due to be submitted to Ofqual regardless of when it was actually uploaded (this date will be made available by Ofqual).	1	^(20)\d\d[-](0[1-9]\|1[012])[-](0[1-9]\|[12][0-9]\|3[01])$	The date in the following format: year (4 digits), a dash, month (2 digits), a dash, day (2 digits)
AcademicYear	The academic year which this data submission relates to (defined as 1 September to 31 August). For example, “2021- 2022”.	2	^(20)\d\d[-](20)\d\d $	The academic year in the following format: start year (4 digits), a dash, end year (4 digits) Format accepted yyyyyyyy
AwardingOrganisation	Name of the awarding organisation	3	^.{1,100}$	1 to 100 characters accepted
AssessmentCode	Unique identifier for the assessment, generated by the AO. Should match the codes given in the Assessment Reference Information template.	4	^.{1,50}$	1 to 50 characters accepted
AssessorAllocation	The basis on which assessors are allocated work to review. Accepted values: Items: Assessors are allocated individual items (e.g., questions) to mark/moderate Scripts: Assessors are allocated whole scripts to mark/moderate Centres: Assessors are allocated whole centres to mark/moderate Mixed: Assessors are allocated a mixture of items/scripts/centres to mark/moderate -2 accepted for internal assessment or computer marked	5	^(Items\| Scripts\| Centres\| Mixed\| -2)$	Accepted values: Items, Scripts, Centres, Mixed -2 accepted for internal assessmen
TotalNumberOfAssessorsOrModerators	The total number of external assessors or AO contracted assessors (markers, moderators, verifiers) who worked on this assessment in this academic year. Assessors who have worked on the same assessment in multiple contexts (e.g., in multiple series or for different versions of the same assessment) should only be counted once per academic year. Only human assessors should be included. Where assessments are computer marked, with no human assessors, please return a zero.	6	^\d{1,4}$	1 to 4 digits accepted
ExternalAssessmentsProduced	The number of different external assessments produced for this assessment within the academic year (e.g. for different sessions, for online and paper versions, and different modified paper versions). -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments	7	^\d{1,3}$	1 to 3 digits accepted -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and nonexamined assessments
ExternalAssessmentsWithoutErrors	Total number of external assessments issued without the need for correction across the academic year (of those given in Field 7). -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments	8	^\d{1,3}$	1 to 3 digits accepted -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and nonexamined assessments
ExternalAssessmentsWithErrors	Number of external assessments sat throughout the academic year for which errata were issued or for which errors were identified during or after the assessment (of those given in Field 7). -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments	9	^\d{1,3}$	1 to 3 digits accepted -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments
NumberOfSupportingMaterialsProduced	Supporting materials here means everything other than traditional question papers that are required for external assessments. E.g. resource materials, CDs, DVDs, video, teachers notes, preliminary materials. -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments. Materials not directly required for external assessments (e.g., textbooks) should not be included.	10	^\d{1,3}$	1 to 3 digits accepted -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and nonexamined assessments
SupportingMaterialsWithoutErrors	Number of supporting materials produced during the academic year without error (of those given in Field 10). -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments	11	^\d{1,3}$	1 to 3 digits accepted -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments
SupportingMaterialsWithErrors	Number of supporting materials produced during the academic year for which errata were issued or for which errors were identified during or after the assessment (of those given in Field 10). -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and non-examined assessments	12	^\d{1,3}$	1 to 3 digits accepted -2 accepted for on-demand non-sessional assessments and nonexamined assessments

Contacts

For all queries relating to the data collection process, amendments to data previously provided, or for general guidance. please contact:

Data services

Ofqual
2nd floor, 1 Friargate
Station Square
Coventry
CV1 2GN

Email Data.Services@ofqual.gov.uk

1. Non examined assessments (NEA) are defined in this collection as: Any type of assessment that is not externally set and taken by candidates at the same time under controlled conditions, for example coursework, practicals, orals, etc. ↩