The School Census is a statutory data collection for all maintained nursery, primary, secondary, middle-deemed primary, middle-deemed secondary, local authority maintained special and non-maintained special schools, academies including free schools, studio schools and university technical colleges and city technology colleges in England. Service children’s education schools may also participate on a voluntary basis.
The School Census collects information about individual pupils and information about the schools themselves, such as their educational provision. The individual pupil information collected includes free school meal eligibility, ethnicity, special educational needs, attendance and exclusions.
The School Census is collected on a termly basis with 3 collections per calendar year Spring School Census in January, Summer School Census in May and Autumn School Census in October. The School Census was first collected in 2006 for secondary schools only and then for all schools from 2007 onwards. Prior to the School Census this information was collected on an annual basis in January via the Pupil Level Annual School Census.
