In February 2007, the British Council launched the on-line global student decision making survey, which targets potential students. These are students in their home country who are interested in studying abroad or pursuing a foreign qualification in their home country.

The survey captures why students want to study overseas, what they are looking for in an institution, location and course, where they look for information and much more, giving you insights into what your target audience is interested so you can tailor your marketing as appropriate.

Throughout 2007, the survey was run in over 30 countries, on-line and at education exhibitions, attracting over 32,000 respondents. This was built upon in 2008, and a further 40,000 responses were captured. We continue to collect data from prospective students every day.

The data is available to Education UK Partnership members and can be accessed in two ways:

			On-line data mining tool - this interactive tool gives you direct, real-time access to the primary decision-making data.
			Automated reports tool - to save you time, these automated reports summarise the top-level information.

The Partnership has agreed to provide access to this student data as part of the core Partnership membership package until April 2010.

As the volume of data available is so great, we are offering training on how to make the most effective use of the data mining tool. We strongly advise that individuals receive this training before using the tool. The training is available in two ways: face-to-face workshops and on-line workshops. Details of future workshops are available.

The tool was introduced at two workshops that took place in May 2008, and web seminars throughout 2008 / 2009. A presentation given at the workshops about the project is available.

If you have any queries about this study, please contact the Education Market Intelligence team.