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In the Australian higher education sector, the challenges to successful engagement and retention experienced by Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander students and communities are considerable. They persist despite many well-intentioned attempts to address this issue and to strengthen equity in participation in the sector. Implicated in this is the absence of a culturally-informed data quality framework for the sector, and the resulting persistence of associated issues such as confusion with data ownership; consistency; standards; usage; and storage. In this paper we argue it is essential that rigorous inquiry be carried out into the type and nature of data required or sought in the higher education sector on, for and with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. This inquiry must involve Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander educators, researchers, evaluators and communities to bring into effect their aspirations for data sovereignty including stewardship and ownership of data, and for culturally beneficial outcomes relating to the use and application of data. It also mandates a collaborative approach with existing government and independent organisations, and Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers from higher education institutions, working together towards the development and implementation of an agreed-upon and decolonised Indigenous data framework for the sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data quality and availability in relation to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander1 students' higher education participation and pathways remains a persistent challenge. In this paper we identify that, to date, there has been no systematic attempt to conceptualise and summarise many important aspects of data quality. The research reported in this paper, enabled through funding from an Office for Learning and Teaching seed grant, redresses this and proposes a conceptual framework for identifying and understanding the impacts of matters of data quality. We argue that the pursuit of a shared statistical literacy is best viewed through the dual lens of whiteness and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander terms of reference. Borrowing from the health sector, we conceptualise data quality issues as upstream, midstream and downstream. This framework identifies the locus of responsibility and intervention as a catalyst for purposeful action to address data quality challenges at the national, sectoral and institutional levels. The benefits of applying the proposed framework include a conceptual lens through which cultural issues may be unmasked; enhanced sector-wide critical statistical literacy; and a systematic accountability framework for assessing efforts to improve data quality. Finally, it is proposed that key elements from this framework might be usefully applied to the development of sector-wide guidelines for the collection, interpretation, use and storage of quality data and statistics to enhance the transition, participation and retention experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander higher education students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]