Key performance measure 10

One of our strategic goals is that students’ interests as consumers are protected before, during and after their studies. The OfS monitors the financial sustainability of registered providers, identifies instances where a provider is at risk of market exit, and may intervene to protect the interests of students who would be affected if the provider could no longer operate.

We do not intervene to prevent a provider from exiting the market. We do, however, intervene to protect students from the consequences of a disorderly exit, as far as possible. A disorderly exit would mean that a provider closed in an unplanned way, perhaps in the middle of an academic year, and without arrangements in place to help students to complete their courses. We intervene to minimise the impact of these events on students.

One of the most important actions we can take in this regard is requiring a provider to develop and, if needed, implement a market exit plan. This can include requiring it to put practical steps in place to enable students to continue their studies at another higher education provider, if they want to do so.

We aim to maximise the proportion of affected students who continue their studies, as measured by KPM 10. Annual data on students continuing their studies following a market exit will vary, depending on the scale and nature of any market exit cases in each year. We also provide data and contextual information about the circumstances of each instance of market exit, where appropriate.

KPM 10 shows that, in the 2022-23 academic year, there were no cases of a registered provider exiting the market in a disorderly way. As there were no students affected by a disorderly exit, we have not calculated a percentage of students affected for the 2022-23 academic year.

In the 2021-22 academic year, there was one case of a registered provider exiting the market. This provider was The Academy of Live and Recorded Arts (ALRA) where a total of 284 students were affected. ALRA closed on 4 April 2022. All students were provided with evidence of their academic achievement at ALRA and were offered the chance to continue studying at Rose Buford College. 268 students were able to and chose to continue their studies with another provider, representing 94.4 per cent of affected students.

Due to the circumstances of this case, we are unable to track the outcomes for individual students affected by this closure. This measure has been calculated from internal data gathered as part of our student protection activity. Students who did not choose to continue their studies at another provider may have had other positive outcomes not covered by this measure, for example starting work in their chosen profession.

The measure shows an annual time series for the proportion of students affected by a market exit who continue towards their qualification, or an equivalent, at another provider. It includes all instances of a registered provider fully closing (without being voluntarily deregistered) during each year.

Students are affected by a market exit when an OfS registered provider completely or substantially ceases to offer higher education in England, meaning they are unable to complete their studies as they had planned. This definition excludes:

• Providers that cease offering higher education after the completion and certification of all students.
• Providers that cease to register students because they are part of a merger between providers.
• Providers that close some courses or campuses but continue to register students.
• Providers that are further education colleges are not included in this measure because they are covered by the Further Education Commissioner’s Special Administration Regime.

A student is defined as ‘continuing’ if they choose to continue to study at another provider on a course at the same level or higher when their provider closes. KPM 10 is calculated as the total number of all ‘continuing’ students as a percentage of the total number of all ‘affected’ students, for each instance of closure.

Therefore, students who continue studying towards the same qualification level or higher following a closure, including those who need to repeat a year, contribute positively towards the indicator. Students who do not continue their study or continue at a lower qualification level following a closure contribute negatively.

For future iterations of this measure, we plan to release an updated methodology based on tracking the individual students for 14 months following a case of market exit.

Download KPM 10 data as an Excel file