About
Each year, the National Student Outcomes Survey (SOS) collects important information about VET students’ satisfaction with their training and their employment and further study outcomes. The survey is designed, subject to response rates, to provide data for registered training organisations (RTOs) with:
- 100 or more qualification completers
- 100 or more short course completers
- 550 or more qualification part-completers
- 250 or more short course part-completers and/or
- 550 or more subject(s) only completers.
RTOs that met the above criteria and/or had enough survey responses for their students may be eligible to view their students’ survey responses via NCVER products specifically designed for RTOs.
Further information about the survey, including frequently asked questions, is available from the Student Outcomes Survey page.
2024 products available soon to RTOs
A new online product, RTO Outcomes Explorer, will be launched in February 2025, enabling RTOs to explore summarised information on their students’ responses to the 2024 survey, alongside comparisons to all students in the same provider type, the same state/territory and nationally. The new product will be available via NCVER’s DataHub, which is a platform that enables secure sign-in to a range of customised NCVER data and products. More information about DataHub, who can access and how to register is available in the Information Kit.
In addition to the free of charge product, RTO Outcomes Explorer, RTOs can request the following data files from the 2024 National Student Outcomes Survey.
- an Excel file containing your students’ responses to the survey question about suggestions for improving training; and/or
- a de-identified unit record file (URF) containing national data with your institute identified in either SAS, SPSS or CSV format.
The Excel file with suggestions for improvement and URF incur a cost and will be available after the release of the 2024 survey data in mid-December 2024.
The URF is only recommended for RTOs with expertise in querying large datasets and with sufficient numbers of students included in the survey (100 or more students for at least one student group). The URF will be available via an application process to ensure privacy and confidentiality is maintained. To obtain an URF, please send a completed URF application form (47 KB Word) to vet_req@ncver.edu.au.
Please ensure the form is signed by your RTO’s CEO or DataHub Organisation Administrator as the Responsible Officer. A Data Custodian can also be appointed, giving them responsibility for the secure storage and protection of the data.
If requesting both an URF and the Excel file with your students’ suggestions for improvement, please mention both the URF and the Excel file in the URF application form. If only requesting the Excel file, please contact vet_req@ncver.edu.au to obtain a quote acceptance form.
2023 prototype online product
NCVER is inviting RTOs to explore a prototype RTO Outcomes Explorer product based on the 2023 survey results.
The prototype will be available in late 2024 via NCVER’s DataHub. Only RTOs with enough responses to the 2023 survey are eligible to access the prototype. RTOs also need to be registered for DataHub to access the prototype. If you are not registered, please contact support@ncver.edu.au. For RTOs already registered for DataHub, RTO CEO and DataHub Organisation Administrators will be invited to access the prototype via an email from DataHub@ncver.edu.au.
All other persons interested in accessing the RTO Outcomes Explorer prototype will require their CEO or DataHub Organisation Administrator to grant them access.