Data set from Progression to higher education or training

Progression to higher education and training national level destinations

Latest data

Published 16 October 2025

Last updated 16 October 2025

Progression to higher education or training at national level, including breakdowns by institution type and student characteristics.

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Data set details

• Theme: Destination of pupils and students
• Publication: Progression to higher education or training
• Release: Academic year 2023/24
• Number of rows: 1,074
• Geographic levels: National
• Indicators:
  • Number of pupils studying level 3 qualifications
  • Sustained a level 4 or higher destination
  • Sustained degree destination
• Filters:
  • Data type
  • Institution group
  • Student characteristic
• Time period: 2015/16 to 2021/22

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Data set preview

Table showing first 5 rows, from underlying data

time_period	time_identifier	geographic_level	country_code	country_name	institution_group	institution_type	breakdown_topic	breakdown	data_type	all_cohort	all_progressed	all_degree	all_top3rd	all_appren	all_htech	acag_cohort	acag_progressed	tlev_cohort	tlev_progressed	otl3_cohort	otl3_progressed
201516	Academic year	National	E92000001	England	State-funded mainstream colleges	Other FE sector colleges	Disadvantage Y11 Status	Disadvantaged	Number of pupils	28035	11104	9124	817	118	1862	14750	6904	10602	3575	2683	625
201516	Academic year	National	E92000001	England	State-funded mainstream colleges	Other FE sector colleges	Disadvantage Y11 Status	Disadvantaged	Percentage	28035	39.6	32.5	2.9	0.4	6.6	14750	46.8	10602	33.7	2683	23.3
201516	Academic year	National	E92000001	England	State-funded mainstream colleges	Other FE sector colleges	Disadvantage Y11 Status	Not Disadvantaged	Number of pupils	90901	39211	31961	4902	862	6388	48641	24648	34437	12725	7823	1838
201516	Academic year	National	E92000001	England	State-funded mainstream colleges	Other FE sector colleges	Disadvantage Y11 Status	Not Disadvantaged	Percentage	90901	43.1	35.2	5.4	0.9	7.0	48641	50.7	34437	37.0	7823	23.5
201516	Academic year	National	E92000001	England	State-funded mainstream colleges	Other FE sector colleges	Total	Total	Number of pupils	118936	50315	41085	5719	980	8250	63391	31552	45039	16300	10506	2463

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Variables in this data set

Table showing first 5 of 15 variables

Variable name	Variable description
acag_cohort	Number of pupils studying academic or applied general qualifications
acag_progressed	Academic/AGQ students who sustained L4+ destination
all_appren	Sustained apprenticeship destination
all_cohort	Number of pupils studying level 3 qualifications
all_degree	Sustained degree destination

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Footnotes

1. Local authority maintained includes community, voluntary aided, voluntary controlled and foundation schools.
2. Note that the methodology used to determine the top third Higher Education Institutions changed in 2020 for the 2016/17 cohort. Instead of the top 33% of institutions, institutions are now only added to the list until 33% of the student intake is represented. Additionally, qualifications equivalent to A levels are now included in the process, rather than solely A levels. Top third results from the 2015/16 cohort are thus not directly comparable with 2016/17 and later cohorts.
3. Free school meal status is given as in year 11. Students with no key stage 4 record were not known to be eligible in year 11 and are included in all other students.
4. State-funded mainstream schools & colleges covers all state-funded mainstream schools, academies, free schools, city technology colleges (CTCs), sixth forms and other FE sector colleges. Excludes alternative provision, special schools, other government department funded colleges and independent schools.
5. Non-selective in highly selective area includes all non-selective schools in local authorities with a high level of selection (where 25% or more of state-funded secondary places are in state-funded selective schools). These local authorities are Bexley, Buckinghamshire, Kent, Lincolnshire, Medway, Poole, Slough, Southend-on-Sea, Sutton, Torbay, Trafford and Wirral.
6. Total state-funded mainstream schools also includes city technology colleges (CTCs). Figures for this institution type are not presented separately. Excludes pupil referral units (PRUs), alternative provision (AP), hospital schools, maintained and non-maintained special schools, independent schools, independent special schools and independent schools approved to take pupils with special educational needs (SEN).
7. LLDD: Students in colleges may be recorded on the ILR as learners with learning difficulties and disabilities. The definitions differ from special educational needs recorded by schools.
8. Other level 3 qualifications are those that are not included elsewhere in 16-18 performance tables.
9. Other FE sector colleges excludes other government department funded colleges.
10. State-funded mainstream colleges include further education sector colleges and other government department funded colleges.
11. Unclassified ethnicity includes students for whom ethnicity was not obtained, refused or could not be determined.
12. Selective schools admit pupils wholly or mainly with reference to ability. These schools are formally designated as grammar schools. The schools status is based on admission policy in the secondary phase (i.e. age 11).
13. Other non-selective includes all non-selective schools that are not in highly selective areas, including those in areas with some selection.
14. Academies and free schools: there are now fewer local authority maintained schools and more academies and free schools than at the start of the 2015/16 academic year (when these school types are reported). In the case of some groups of school, such as University Technical Colleges (UTCs), this means the picture of the sector given in these statistics includes some of the first schools of this type to open and is based on a relatively small number of schools, many of which only had students joining for the last year of key stage 4 study.
15. Disadvantage status is given as in year 11. Disadvantaged students are defined as those who were eligible for free school meals at any point in the previous six years or having been looked after by their local authority. These are the students who would have been in receipt of the pupil premium when in year 11. Students with no key stage 4 record were not known to be disadvantaged in year 11 and are included in all other students.
16. Note that the methodology used to determine the top third Higher Education Institutions changed in 2024 for the 2020/21 cohort.  The change is covered in detail within the accompanying methodology document.
17. The way we decide when a student is at the end of 16 to 18 study changed for the 2020/21 and 2021/22 cohorts.  This change means the make up of these cohorts are different to previous years, and also to each other due to effects from the transition from the old criteria to the new. As such any comparison to previous years should be avoided.

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