ILR Tools

About the ILR

The ILR is the main learner-level data return for further education and skills providers in England. It exists so publicly funded learning can be recorded consistently, checked for quality, used to calculate funding, and reported in statistics.

The ISR and ILR

ISR

Individual Student Record. The earlier student-level data return used by further education colleges before the ILR. It recorded individual enrolments and student characteristics for funding, planning, and statistical purposes.

ILR

Individualised Learner Record. The successor learner-level return for the wider further education and skills sector. It records learners, aims, funding, outcomes, destinations, and monitoring information for each academic year.

Transition from ISR to ILR XML

The data collection moved from a student record to a learner record, and then from fixed-width flat files to XML returns.

  1. 1992 to 2001

    ISR

    After the 1992 further education reforms transferred FE Colleges from Local Authority control and funding to being independent institutions with central funding.

  2. 2002 to 2010

    ILR Flat File

    The ILR replaced the ISR as the Learning and Skills Council brought FE and work-based learning data into a single individualised learner return. These ILR submissions used fixed-width flat files.

  3. 2011 onwards

    ILR XML

    The ILR moved to XML, allowing the file structure to represent nested learners, learning deliveries, employment status records, and related monitoring fields more clearly than the flat-file format.

Numbered Fields

Older ISR and ILR flat-file returns identified each item of data with a short numbered field code. For example, learner or student details could appear as fields such as S1, qualification or learning aim details could appear as fields such as Q1, and summary or supplementary sections could include fields such as E10.

In the XML ILR, the same kinds of data are now recorded as named elements and attributes within the file structure rather than only as numbered positions. This makes the relationship between records clearer: a Student is now a Learner, and a Qualification is now an Aim or Learning Delivery.

ISR and ILR numbered field prefixes
ISR Code ILR Flat File Code ILR XML Name Description
S L Learner Student or learner-level details, including identifying and demographic information.
SHE LearnerHE Learner-level Higher Education information.
Q A LearningDelivery Qualification, aim, or enrolment details for what the student or learner was studying.
QHE H LearningDeliveryHE Qualification or enrolment details for Higher Education learning aims.
E Details of the qualifications the learner had on entry to the course, including any achieved at the same institution. In later returns this is recorded, in a more limited form, as part of the learner dataset.
E Information specific to European Social Fund co-financing. In later returns this is recorded within other datasets.

The ILR Fields Viewer shows the current named ILR fields alongside their flat-file mappings where available.

Who is ILR data returned to?

The organisation receiving or managing the return has changed as the English further education funding system has been reorganised.

  1. 6 May 1992 to 31 March 2001

    FEFC

    Following the 1992 further education reforms transferring FE Colleges from Local Authority control and funding to being independent institutions with central funding.

  2. 1 April 2001 to 31 March 2010

    LSC

    The Learning and Skills Council replaced the FEFC and Training and Enterprise Councils, taking responsibility for planning and funding post-16 learning outside higher education.

  3. 1 April 2010 to 31 March 2012

    SFA + YPLA

    The LSC was replaced by the Skills Funding Agency for adult skills and apprenticeships, while young people's funding moved to Young People's Learning Agency from 1 April 2012.

  4. 1 April 2012 to 31 March 2017

    SFA + EFA

    The YPLA was replaced by the Education Funding Agency from 1 April 2012.

  5. 1 April 2017 to 31 March 2025

    ESFA

    The Education and Skills Funding Agency was formed by merging the SFA and EFA, bringing education, apprenticeships, and skills funding into one executive agency.

    Devolved regions receive extracts of ILR data directly from the ESFA.

  6. From 1 April 2025

    DfE

    ESFA functions transferred into the core Department for Education, so ILR collection and related services now sit under DfE.

    Devolved regions continue to receive extracts of ILR data directly from the Department for Education.