Data Collections Compliance Certificate

The Compliance Certificate process requires approved authorities to answer three questions about policy requirements relating to section 77 of the Act and sections 42, 56(f) and 59 of the Regulations on behalf of the school(s) you operated during the 2024 school year. These requirements include:

• implementing the Australian Curriculum
• providing information about a school’s students – for example, any other information specified in the Data standards manual: Student background characteristics
• providing understandable student A to E reports to the parents or carers of each child.

Since the 2024 Compliance Certificate and Compliance Certificate Verification Exercise processes (for the 2023 school year) is being undertaken at a school level, rather than at the approved authority level.

In addition, the Compliance Certificate no longer includes a question on National Assessment Program (NAP) participation. This information is publicly available on the MySchool website.

The Compliance Certificate process is a risk-based annual assurance activity undertaken by the Department of Education (the department).

The risk-based approach means that a sample of schools will be selected to complete the Compliance Certificate each year.

If your school(s) has been selected for the 2025 Compliance Certificate process (for the 2024 school year), approved authority representatives will receive notification via email in August 2025.

The Compliance Certificate collection opens on SchoolsHUB at 9:00am AEST on Monday 11 August 2025.

Selected approved authorities must submit the Compliance Certificate by 5:00pm AEST on Friday 26 September 2025.

The 2025 Compliance Certificate relates to activity in the 2024 school year only.

Approved authorities of school(s) will be required to answer the following 3 questions in relation to the selected school(s) for the 2024 school year:

1. For the previous school year, did your school(s) implement the Australian Curriculum (teach, assess and report on student achievement using the content and standards in the curriculum) or another curriculum recognised as comparable by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), and included in ACARA’s Recognition Register?
2. For the previous school year, did your school(s) collect and report information on the gender of the student, Indigenous status of the student, socioeconomic background (parental education and occupation) and language background of all students?
3. For the previous school year, did your school(s) provide parents and carers of students in years 1 to 10 with reports on student achievement for each subject using A to E or an equivalent scale?

The department will review the information provided on the Compliance Certificate and may contact approved authorities for further information or clarification.

Approved authorities should ensure the school(s) selected for the 2025 Compliance Certificate process are advised. If you are notified of inclusion by the department, please ensure you advise your school(s) of their selection for the 2025 Compliance Certificate process.

The Compliance Certificate Verification Exercise confirms that the information provided through the Compliance Certificate process is accurate, complete, and reliable.

Each year, a sample of schools are selected to provide documentation to support the declarations made in their Compliance Certificate and where required, any additional information regarding their other ongoing policy requirements. If your school is selected to participate in the Compliance Certificate Verification Exercise, the approved authority representatives will receive notification via email from October 2025.

All materials received from the approved authority and/or schools will be reviewed by the department to assess whether further information or investigation is required.