Longitudinal Education Outcomes (LEO) is a world-leading dataset created by the Department for Education. It contains de-identified information on the characteristics, education, employment, benefits, and earnings of people in Britain. It has the potential to provide transformative insight and evidence on the longer-term labour market outcomes and educational pathways of (currently) around 38 million individuals. The version of LEO shared via the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Secure Research Service focuses on those who have participated in the education system in England and forms part of the ADR England portfolio.  

This year the Department for Education has made available via the ONS Secure Research Service some new datasets which are linkable to LEO. LEO has always included de-identified records from schools, further and higher education institutions. It now also contains data on:  

  • university applications, from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS)  

  • the businesses in which individuals work, via a link to the Inter-Departmental Business Register   

  • individuals’ participation in the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and Income Support Scheme during the pandemic.  

Research Data Scotland is working towards delivering LEO iteration 1 (Scotland). This will make Scottish university graduate data available through an accredited ONS trusted research environment later in 2024. 

The LEO team is also in the process of developing ‘low-fidelity’ synthetic data. This is mock data that has been created to reflect the format of the original data, such as its layout and the type of information it contains, but which does not contain any personal data. Synthetic data can be used to help researchers understand the real data and to support users to progress their projects more rapidly. 

Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) data 

The UCAS data initially linked to LEO contains the university applications of all 18-year-old applicants in England. This includes information on the courses to which individuals have applied and whether they received an offer, as well as predicted A-level (or equivalent) grades. This will support researchers to understand more about how university applications and offers vary across background characteristics not captured in the UCAS data, for example, by early attainment in primary school or special educational needs status.   

It will also enable researchers to gain greater understanding of the role of individual preferences and predicted grades in generating links between socioeconomic background, education choices, and later outcomes. For example, the addition of UCAS data will enable researchers to compare individuals who made the same application decisions but ended up in different institutions - or who may have made different choices if they had applied to university with actual rather than predicted grades - to explore whether the benefits of going to university remain the same. In future, data on applicants of all ages will be added to LEO.  

Inter-Departmental Business Register data 

The Inter-Departmental Business Register is a comprehensive list of businesses that pay Value-Added Tax (VAT) or operate a Pay-As-You-Earn (PAYE) scheme. Linking it to LEO allows researchers to distinguish the type of business in which an individual works (via a pseudonym – a numerical code used instead of the business’s name to prevent identification of businesses or individuals).

Researchers can access some information about that business, such as the industry in which it is based. They can also see the characteristics of people who work together, and whether people who are trained in particular subjects go on to work in similar industries. This will allow the research community to address important questions about the links between education, skills and productivity, and how this varies across firms or industries.  

Accessing the data

Accredited researchers can apply to access the Longitudinal Education Outcomes (LEO) standard extract via the ONS Secure Research Service.

Visit the flagship dataset page