Census Data

Problem

As a public-school teacher in a majority minority school I decided to use this opportunity to investigate where people of color are actually doing well in the state of North Carolina. As it seems the data is not exactly assembled in that manner, I used the poverty data instead with the logic that in areas where the percentage of people of color living in poverty is low that that could indicate areas where they are doing well.

Analysis Procedures

Methods

I used the Excel to Table tool to import the Census data table into ArcGIS Pro after completing some formatting in Excel. I then added the shapefiles for the state boundary and the census tracts. Then I added a field in the census tract file and calculated the field using the double format so that the data type would match so they could be successfully joined together. Then I resymbolized the data using graduated colors to get a range of values for each census block that give a visual representation of the percentage of African American’s living below the poverty line (HC03_EST_VC19 Percent below poverty level; Estimate; RACE AND HISPANIC OR LATINO ORIGIN - Black or African American alone) in each block. I then ran an Anselin Local Moran's I cluster analysis to look for areas of low value clusters to get an idea of where in North Carolina people of color have better incomes and less poverty. Not unsurprisingly there are areas in both the Raleigh/Durham & Charlotte regions where this is the case.

Results

Application & Reflection

In this assignment, I learned how to search for and download and work with census data. I learned what type of data is available and where and how to access it. There are myriad social questions that can be answered using the census for instance it would be interesting to expound on the analysis that I’ve done already and look more closely at the type of jobs that African Americans in the lower poverty areas are doing and conversely where they are not represented. This information could be valuable for the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) and local colleges to see where and how to allocate recruitment resources intended for persons of color.