Associations between characteristics of students

Associations between characteristics of students (ABCS) is a set of analyses that seeks to better understand how education outcomes vary for groups of students holding different sets of characteristics. We define groups of students by looking at a set of characteristics - so that we can determine the effect of not just one characteristic on an outcome, but the effect of multiple characteristics.

This report sets out the methodology for creating ABCS measures. It also discusses examples of where these measures have highlighted groups of students with poor outcomes that may not have been seen when only looking at single characteristics.

The report focuses on outcomes of entry to higher education and continuation in higher education, but the ABCS work sets out a framework that could be used for analysis of other student outcomes, such as degree attainment and employment after graduation.

See the data related to this report