The ADMIN Research Centre based at the Institue of Education (University of London) is a research node within the National Centre for Research Methods sponsored by the Economic and Social Research Council. The centre has concentrated on developing accessible methods to allow researchers to maximise the information within their administrative data sources, particularly making use of linkages to survey data, and deliver analysis to enhance the decision making of policy-makers. In this presentation we outline work that has been undertaken within the Centre that; utilises the administrative data in isolation such as measuring school performance, enhances the utility of the survey data with the administrative data such as contextual modelling and small area estimation, enhances the utility of the administrative data with information from the survey data. The examples are primarily drawn from analysis of the pupil-level census data generated within the public school system in England linked to their the pupils' performance is key examinations and also linked to a sample of pupils that make-up the 'Longitudinal Study of Young People in England'.

Keywords: Linked administrative and survey data; Policy analysis; School performance

Biography: Dr Brown is a Reader in Survey Statistics at the University of Southampton. He studied for his PhD at Southampton looking at census coverage assessment and adjustment working closely with the Office for National Statistics as they prepared for the 2001 Census. He then became a lecturer at Southampton running the MSc in Official Statistics for eight years. In 2008 he joined the Institute of Education as a Senior Lecturer in Social Statistics and as part of the ADMIN Research Centre before returning to Southampton at the end of 2010; where he is responsible for leading the research contract between Southampton and the Office for National Statistics.