Planning research with administrative data for youth transitions: From research priorities to project design

The Unlocking Youth Transitions Data series

Join the ADR England Community Catalyst: Youth Transitions Co-investigators for the first in a series of three free webinars this April, designed to support early career researchers in using administrative data for youth transitions research.

The series offers:

• Practical guidance on research design: develop robust, feasible, and well‑justified research proposals using administrative data
• Insight into the use of administrative datasets: learn about the practicalities of using administrative data when implementing quasi-experimental evaluation techniques
• Approaches to measuring and analysing social background: using administrative datasets such as Free School Meals (FSM) and Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD).

We recommend attending all three webinars, as they are designed to build on one another. Each session will last one hour, with additional time for questions and discussion. The three webinars in the series are:

• Planning research with administrative data for youth transitions: From research priorities to project design: Tuesday 14 April. Register now.
• Using the PICO (Population, intervention, comparator and outcomes) framework in LEO studies of post-16 learning: Wednesday 15 April. Register now. 
• Creating and using proxy measures of socioeconomic background in LEO: Thursday 23 April. Register now. 

Planning research with administrative data for youth transitions: From research priorities to project design

Tuesday 14 April, 12:00 - 13:30

Speaker: Jake Anders, Professor of Quantitative Social Science, UCL

Administrative data offers enormous potential for understanding youth transitions, but working with these data poses unique challenges.

This webinar provides a practical introduction to planning youth transitions research using administrative data, outlining the unique considerations that arise when working within England’s data governance and trusted research environment (TRE) landscape.

Register now

About the session

The session focuses on what researchers need to know before accessing data, including understanding its operational origins, identifying common limitations, and assessing feasibility using documentation and synthetic resources. It also covers the implications of TRE workflows, approval processes, and disclosure controls for research planning and project design.

Attendees will gain clear, actionable guidance to support the development of robust, feasible, and well‑justified research proposals using administrative data.

By attending, you will:

• understand more about opportunities and limitations of administrative data for youth transitions research;
• learn practical approaches for assessing feasibility before accessing data, including the use of metadata, documentation, and synthetic data;
• gain insight into TRE governance, workflows, and output rules—and how these shape research planning.

About the speaker

Jake Anders is Professor of Quantitative Social Science at the UCL Centre for Education Policy and Equalising Opportunities. Jake’s research focuses on better understanding the causes and consequences of educational inequalities, evaluating policies and programmes aiming to reduce these inequalities, and how best to do this evaluation.

Event details

When: Tuesday 14 April, 12:00 - 12:30

Where: Online

Cost: Free

Registration: Via Zoom

If you have any issues registering for the webinar please contact: youthtransitions@nfer.ac.uk

Co-funded by ADR England, Youth Futures Foundation, and the Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO), the ADR England Research Community Catalyst: Youth Transitions aims to increase use of ADR UK flagship datasets, and to support a community of researchers and analysts focused on youth transitions, particularly the journeys of disadvantaged young people into and out of education and employment. As part of this work, they have developed a research agenda, built on a comprehensive review of the evidence and national stakeholder consultation.