Student income and expenditure survey 2014 to 2015

Technical Report

This is a report on the research methods used in the Student Income and Expenditure Survey 2014/15 (SIES 2014/15) carried out on behalf of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) and the Welsh Government (WG), the main source of data in this report.

SIES is a large-scale comprehensive survey that collects detailed information on the income, expenditure and debt levels of higher education (HE) students. The 2014/15 survey is the latest in a series of surveys carried out at approximately three year intervals.

In previous waves of SIES (up to and including 2007/08), the survey consisted of a 60 minute face-to-face interview, while in 2011/12 and 2014/15 a 30 minute web/ telephone survey was used.Each survey has included an expenditure diary which students, who are willing to do so, complete.

The 2014/15 survey assesses the impact of the greatest changes to student funding and support since 1998. These changes were introduced in September 2012 for those starting HE in the 2012/13 academic year. SIES 2011/12 provides a baseline for assessing the impact of these changes.

The NatCen Social Research (NatCen) and the Institute for Employment Studies (IES) conducted the 2014/15 SIES in close collaboration. NatCen had overall responsibility for the delivery of the survey, lead responsibility for the sample design, questionnaire design, fieldwork with students and data preparation. IES had lead responsibility for collecting sample data from institutions, and data analysis and report writing.