TCSI Newsletter August 2020

We have updated the factsheet to include information on the steps required to set up TCSI test accounts for education providers and TCSI developers.

The updated factsheet can be found on the TCSI Support website here: https://www.tcsisupport.gov.au/Transitioning-to-TCSI/testing-for-providers

TCSI Education Provider Webinars

TCSI provider webinars are recorded and can be viewed, along with their slides, on the TCSI Support Website now, under the Help & support tab.

To ensure you are included on all future Education Provider webinar invitations and for a great way to get all the up-to-date information on TCSI please register yourself using the subscribe link on the Webinars page.

If you are already registered and not receiving invitations, please check your junk folder or contact your mail administrator to make sure it is not being filtered out.

TCSI Developer Webinars

If you are a TCSI Developer, please make sure you have registered with the TCSI Support team. We use the contact information from GovTEAMS to send developer webinar invitations and provide access to developer information and webinar recordings.

Timelines for reporting in HEPCAT in 2021

The TCSI APIs and data entry functionality will be available to test and develop against in early 2021, ready for implementation in 2022.

Information on COVID-19 short courses is available on Course Seeker.

It is only study delivered under these arrangements that must be reported using the following existing codes and elements in HEPCAT:

1. Report the course type (Element 310 - Course of study type code) using the existing codes:
   • Undergraduate course - Code 22 Other undergraduate award course
   • Postgraduate course - Code 11 Graduate certificate.
2. Report the course name (Element 308) that matches a course on your list of short courses, as displayed on Course Seeker.
3. Report the value 8999 for the postcode on Element 477 - Postcode or overseas country code location of Higher Education/VET Provider campus/delivery location when you report the unit of study on the Higher Education Load Liability File.
4. Use code 7 on Element 392 Maximum Student Contribution Amount.
5. Use code 201 on Element 490 Student Status to indicate that students enrolled in short courses are supported through HECS‑HELP.

Program requirements for higher education certificates

The higher education funding team will be able to provide you with any further requirements and information you need to administer these courses. You can contact the team at: CGS@dese.gov.au.

The latest Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC) 2020, released on 30 June 2020, have been published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) with updated Field of Research (FoR) codes.

This will have an impact on reporting of Primary field of research (E594) and Secondary field of research (E595).  The field of research codes in TSCI will be updated to align with the ANZSRC 2020 codes before those elements are required in TCSI. They will only be required for Higher Degree by Research (HDR) students with a census date after 1 January 2021.

The latest Fields of Research codes, including the ANZSRC 2020 correspondence from ANZSRC 2008, are available from the ABS website. The correspondence provides a detailed comparison of the conceptual relationship between research categories in ANZSRC 2020 and research categories in ANZSRC 2008.

Field of research codes are required for new and continuing HDR students within 14 days of the census date. As a transitional arrangement real-time reporting of Field of Research codes may be delayed until 30 June 2021.

The new Field of Research codes will require an update to the reporting requirements issued under the Ministerial Notice. In the meantime, the website will be updated to make the new requirement clear.

Providers are required to upload all 2020 unit of study completions data, from 1 January 2020 to 31 August 2020, into HEPCAT by 31 October 2020.

The mid-year upload of unit of study completions data was planned reduce the amount of data providers will need to upload in January 2021 while they are also in the process of transitioning to TCSI.

The end of year unit of study completions data upload is one of the largest submissions for providers and has the highest error rate of any submission. In order to reduce pressure on providers the Department is facilitating incremental reporting of the unit of study completions data.

You can also provide further unit of study completions data through TCSI if you haven’t provided them through HEPCAT.

For those providers whose systems will prevent incremental reporting of this data, please contact the TCSI Support team to advise that you will be submitting a single unit of study completions data upload for 2020 completions.

Your response to the survey will help the TCSI project team to better support your clients and to support your development and releases. Please complete one of the following TCSI Developer surveys no later than 4 September 2020.

Information to consider when completing the survey:

• What user acceptance testing is planned for your product?
• What are your release timeframes?
• What support do you need?

If you are a vendor and you are building a product for your users, please complete this survey:

• https://survey.websurveycreator.com/s.aspx?s=43bbdf0d-911d-4bd8-b798-e4c30272b519

If you are an in-house developer, such as a university or provider that is building their own software solution, please complete this survey:

• https://survey.websurveycreator.com/s.aspx?s=64fe37a9-7a2f-47e2-a295-4d22405f56d8

Please note that responses to the survey are confidential and will not be shared outside the Department of Education, Skills and Employment and Services Australia.