How to access EUROSTUDENT micro data on the social dimension of higher education from over 130,000 students?

In the EUROSTUDENT project, we collect and analyse comparable data on the social dimension of European higher education. The project covers a wide range of topics related to students’ social and economic conditions. To expand the range of users of EUROSTUDENT data and facilitate research by project-external researchers, EUROSTUDENT VII student-level micro data is available free of charge from May 2021 as a scientific use file. This allows the use of more advanced statistical methods.

The first version of the EUROSTUDENT scientific use file combines EUROSTUDENT survey data from the following EUROSTUDENT countries: Austria, Croatia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Hungary, Ireland, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, and Slovenia. The data was collected prior to Covid-19 pandemic in 2019. While the EUROSTUDENT database of indicators allows browsing and downloading aggregated data on the country level, the new scientific use file includes micro data, i.e., anonymised responses from over 130 000 individual students.

The scientific use file is targeted at higher education researchers, but also researchers and non-profit organisations from other fields interested in the social dimension of higher education. The data covers topics like the social background of students, transitions in HE, student employment and student time budget, student resources, expenses, housing, mobility and study conditions. Importantly, the data is not available for non-scientific profit purposes, like market research.

In order to access the data, registration and filling a brief application form is required, including a short description of the purpose for requesting the data.

Not sure if EUROSTUDENT VII scientific use file is right for your research? You can access metadata, including the survey instrument, the list of variables and the methods report without registration here.

The scientific use file was prepared by EUROSTUDENT national research teams, ResearchNed and the Research Data Centre for Higher Education and Science Studies (FDZ-DZHW).

EUROSTUDENT VII Scientific Use File