Nexus provides the facility to import a Current CLA Cohort at any point in time. This is to allow for the difference in the Looked After cohort at any point in the year and that which was submitted in the SSDA903 census. This article describes the process of adding that Current CLA Cohort into the system and maintaining it.
Who this is for
Anyone in Virtual Schools or LA data teams who needs to understand the concept of the Current CLA Cohort and those involved in preparing and importing it.
Before you start
This import is restricted to users with Keypas CLA permissions.
Your current CLA cohort can be viewed in Insight for all Key Stages. Please note that this dataset is only available in Nova for KS4 reports using the Results Day source.
Who should be included in the Current CLA Cohort
Your current CLA cohort will initially be populated by the children that were part of your last SSDA903 census return. See the guide to Obtaining and Importing CLA Data for further details. The children in your SSDA903 will be matched to school census records where possible so details such as ethnicity and language can be included.
The purpose of the import process described below and the accompanying Keypas grids is to allow you to update your CLA cohort to reflect either the current position (today) or at another point in time you select which is useful to your reporting and analysis. This can be done in a couple of ways:
- If a child in your SSDA903 cannot be matched to a school census record, you can update the record in your Current CLA Cohort with information such as ULN or ethnicity.
- If there are children that are not in your SSDA903 because they have become looked after since your last census return, you can add these children to your Current CLA cohort using the import.
Why update the current cohort?
Reports associated with the CLA cohort are based on the cohort as it was on the census date. By the time that the census is submitted to DfE that information is already 3 months out of date with new children being added to the cohort and some no longer looked after. By updating the current cohort (as well as using the process to correct any errors/omissions) you can have a view in reports of both the 'statutory' SSDA903 cohort that will mirror that used in DfE statistics, but also the option to produce reports based on the current, up to date cohort (which can be updated as often as you need to during the year)
Despite the name 'Current', this cohort does not have to be the most up to date version of the cohort. You could go back to a previous point for reporting. The only limitation is that you can only hold one Current CLA cohort in Nexus per year at a time, but it can be replaced as often as needed. (The SSDA903 version of the cohort is separate and not affected by loading or changing the Current CLA cohort)
Current CLA Cohort Import
Your import file template for the current CLA cohort can be exported from the Keypas grid called Manage Current CLA Cohort. By doing it from this location your previous Current CLA Cohort will be pre-populated into the grid.
For those children already on the grid you can manually update the records directly on the grid or export the grid to update their information if necessary. For speed, we would usually recommend exporting and working in Excel.
Once you have updated the records in your CSV or added new children you can import this data back into Nexus.
Keypas > Imports > Import New File > Current CLA Cohort
You don't need to re-import all children if you have no updates for those records, but it is also acceptable to do this rather than removing them from your CSV.
You can also get a copy of the CSV template from the link on the import page, if you are only importing new children and not updating existing ones. This is more suitable as the starting position for this process.
Once you have prepared your file, save it to a location where you can work with it again easily as that is another way to update the Current CLA Cohort - just keep working with the same file (saving off copies at different points in time to allow you to go back to those points for reporting if necessary or beneficial).
Importing the file
Once you are ready to import the file, go back to Keypas > Imports > Import New File > Current CLA Cohort. Select the appropriate result year and drag the file into the 'drop your files here' box. Then click Upload in the usual way.
Last reviewed / owner
Last reviewed: August 2026 - Owner: Technical Support Director