Census Workshops at Davis Library, UNC - Open to all!

On November 16th (GIS Day), the Davis Library Research Hub will be hosting Jonathan Schroeder from the Minnesota Population Center (MPC). Attendance is free and open to the UNCG community. See the links below for times and more information.

Attendees will need to pay for parking. There are two visitor parking lots near Davis Library likely to have spaces at the times of these workshops:  the Raleigh Road Lot and the Rams Head Parking Lot.  The rate in these lots is $1.50 / hour.  In addition there are metered spaces along Raleigh Road, South Road and Country Club Drive with two-hour (or more) limits.  

Morning workshop

Intro to NHGIS: Geographic Data for U.S. Censuses from 1790 to the Present

The National Historical Geographic Information System (www.nhgis.org) provides free online access to summary tables and GIS boundary files for U.S. censuses and surveys going back to 1790. In addition to historical county and state data, NHGIS provides more recent data for all levels of census geography down to tracts and blocks. This workshop will familiarize participants with the breadth and depth of NHGIS resources and demonstrate how to use the NHGIS Data Finder to explore what’s available and download customized extracts.

Afternoon talk

NHGIS Time Series Tables: Harmonizing Geographic Census Data across Time

In recent years, NHGIS (www.nhgis.org) has begun releasing time series tables, which link together comparable statistics from multiple censuses in customized downloadable bundles. There are now thousands of time series available, organized into hundreds of tables, mainly covering statistics from the 1970-2010 censuses and the 2012 American Community Survey. The newest tables provide 2000 and 2010 statistics for 2010 census units at 10 geographic levels, including census tracts, block groups, ZIP Code Tabulation Areas, and census places. These tables use an advanced interpolation method to produce high-quality 2000 estimates where boundaries changed between censuses. Work is also underway to provide 1990 estimates for 2010 units. In this talk, I present an overview of current and planned NHGIS time series features, highlighting how they can simplify the measurement and mapping of changes in census data, demonstrating advantages of our interpolation approach relative to others in use, and previewing how we are addressing new estimation challenges as we extend tables to cover more years and subjects.