Accuracy and reliability
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Population and Education, Social StatisticsMikkel Jonasson Pedersen
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The administrative systems that are the basis for the statistics are used by the institutions for their own daily administration of the students and also for the payment of different economic grants. Correct registers are therefore necessary for the economy of the institutions and contributes to an expected high quality of the data source. However, occasional errors will almost always occur. These are almost always fixed before next year's publication of data.
Overall accuracy
The precision of the statistics is high, because data is taken directly from the administrative systems of the educational institutions. Uncertainty arises when the institutions register certain students or educations wrong. When this is discovered, the error is fixed before next year's publication of data. In more specific groups and educations the uncertainty might be higher.
Sampling error
Not relevant for these statistics, since it is a total counting.
Non-sampling error
Coverage errors can be persons not registered in the statistics. Measurement errors and missing records can occur due to wrong registrations from the institutions. When dates overlap for a student, the student usually is registered as finished on the first education on the date where he is registered to begin on the next education.
Quality management
Statistics Denmark follows the recommendations on organisation and management of quality given in the Code of Practice for European Statistics (CoP) and the implementation guidelines given in the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (QAF). A Working Group on Quality and a central quality assurance function have been established to continuously carry through control of products and processes.
Quality assurance
Statistics Denmark follows the principles in the Code of Practice for European Statistics (CoP) and uses the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (QAF) for the implementation of the principles. This involves continuous decentralized and central control of products and processes based on documentation following international standards. The central quality assurance function reports to the Working Group on Quality. Reports include suggestions for improvement that are assessed, decided and subsequently implemented.
Quality assessment
The strength of the statistics is that data are collected from the institutions' administrative registers, which the institutions use for the administration of their students. Errors in the administrative registers are however unavoidable.
Data revision - policy
Statistics Denmark revises published figures in accordance with the Revision Policy for Statistics Denmark. The common procedures and principles of the Revision Policy are for some statistics supplemented by a specific revision practice.
Data revision practice
The institutions have the possibility of updating backwards in time when reporting data. When that happens, data from previous years are revised.