Integrated Student Loan Dataset

Integrated Student Loan Dataset

The integrated data set combines:

• information collected by tertiary education providers on students and on their enrolments and courses;
• information collected by StudyLink on students' borrowings under the Student Loan Scheme;
• data on student loan balances and repayments from Inland Revenue; and
• Inland Revenue data on income and tax status.

The integrated data set enables study of the effects of the Student Loan Scheme by giving us a better understanding of, for example, the borrowing levels and repayment rates of different groups of borrowers. Just as important, it enables us to link education data fields to post-study incomes, so we can work out how those who take particular types of qualifications fare in the labour market. And we can control for demographic factors or, for instance, highest school qualification. It gives us a unique opportunity to study returns to education in a way that is more direct than the usual approaches using population data.

The data set is limited. At present, it covers only the years 1997 to 2000, though it will be extended to include 2001 and 2002 data later this month and it will be updated annually thereafter. And it covers only those who use the loan scheme, not all who pass through the tertiary education.

Names and addresses have been removed from the data set to protect the privacy of individuals. Access to the data is restricted to a limited number of Ministry of Education analysts.

Related Education Counts Documents

Data Collections: a description of different data collections.

Collection Forms: copies of the forms used to capture information for the data collections.

Guidelines: guidance on the collection and/or use of data collections.

Code Sets: lists of values used to code data items on the data collection forms.