{"title":"Poyntr Pulse Methodology","version":"1.0","sections":[{"heading":"Data Sources","content":"Poyntr Pulse aggregates anonymised data from participating institutions using the Poyntr youth wellbeing platform. Data includes emotional wellbeing indicators, engagement patterns, and safeguarding concern distributions. No individual student data is ever included."},{"heading":"Anonymisation","content":"All data is subject to multi-layered anonymisation. (1) K-anonymity: aggregate cells with fewer than 50 students are suppressed entirely and returned as null. Suppressed categories are still listed (as null) to prevent enumeration inference. (2) Differential privacy: calibrated Gaussian noise (epsilon=1.0) is applied to all counts, percentages, and scores before storage. Noise magnitude scales inversely with cohort size — smaller cohorts receive proportionally more noise. Exact counts are rounded to the nearest 10 after noise injection. True values are not recoverable from stored data. (3) Temporal smoothing: the published wellbeing score is a 4-week rolling average, preventing week-over-week differencing attacks. (4) Dimension limits: cross-tabulations are capped at 3 dimensions to prevent small-cell creation."},{"heading":"Wellbeing Score","content":"The Poyntr Youth Wellbeing Score (0-100) is a composite indicator weighted across four dimensions: emotional state (40%, based on traffic light distribution), emotional trajectory (30%, based on improving/stable/declining trends), platform engagement (20%, as a proxy for help-seeking behaviour), and cognitive resilience (10%, based on self-efficacy and resilience indicators)."},{"heading":"Regional Breakdown","content":"Regional data is mapped from institution postcodes to the 9 standard English regions. Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland are reported separately where sufficient data exists."},{"heading":"Institutional Benchmarking","content":"Individual institutions that opt in receive benchmarks comparing their indicators against anonymised peer averages. Peers are matched by institution type and region. No institution can identify specific peer institutions from the benchmark data."},{"heading":"Publication Schedule","content":"Poyntr Pulse is computed weekly (every Sunday at 03:00 UTC) and published automatically. Historical data is available for trend analysis."},{"heading":"Limitations","content":"Poyntr Pulse reflects only institutions using the Poyntr platform and is not a representative sample of all UK young people. The data should be interpreted alongside other national surveys and indicators. Self-selection bias applies: institutions that adopt youth wellbeing technology may differ systematically from those that do not."}]}