Is this legal advice?

No. This checklist is practical guidance for governance conversations. Always follow your institution’s policies and seek appropriate legal/data protection advice.

Do we need an audit trail for student comment analysis?

If outputs will be shared with panels or used for institutional decisions, an audit trail is strongly recommended so you can explain methodology and changes over time.

What’s the biggest avoidable risk?

Sending sensitive text to uncontrolled tools (including public LLM APIs) or publishing small-cohort outputs that increase re-identification risk.

Student comment analysis governance checklist for UK HE

By Student Voice AI

Published Jan 27, 2026 · Updated Jan 27, 2026

Answer first

If you want student comment analysis to be usable beyond a single analyst (and defensible for TEF/QA/Board reporting), you need three things: privacy controls, repeatability, and traceability. This checklist covers the minimum governance most UK HE teams need before scaling open-text analysis.

For a method decision guide, see Best NSS comment analysis (2025). For a governed operational workflow, see Student Voice Analytics.

Governance checklist

Data protection & privacy

Data classification: what personal data may appear in comments?
Redaction policy: what is removed, and how is it tested?
Residency: where is data processed and stored (UK/EU/other)?
Access: least-privilege access controls, named owners, onboarding/offboarding.
Retention: how long raw text and derived outputs are retained.

Method governance (repeatability)

Stable taxonomy with definitions and change control.
Versioning for models/prompts and any rulesets.
QA protocol: sampling, disagreement handling, edge-case review.
Coverage reporting: % classified, % excluded, and why.

Reporting governance (panel-ready outputs)

Small-cohort rules (roll-ups, thresholds, multi-year aggregation).
Caveats: what sentiment/percentages mean and what they don’t.
Traceability: link headline claims back to supporting (anonymised) evidence.
Change log: what changed vs last cycle and why.

Vendor/tool validation (if applicable)

Confirm whether any text is sent to third-party LLM APIs.
Confirm auditability (exports of run parameters, logs, and outputs).
Confirm BI export formats and repeatable schemas.

Contact Student Voice Analytics

Book time with the team to map current survey coverage, governance requirements, and handover timelines.

Email info@studentvoice.ai

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