Having trouble accessing government information? See the Libraries’ guide to Alternative Sources for Federal Information and Data.

EDUC 885 - Secondary Data Analysis (Fall 2019): Finding Data

Resources for finding secondary data; visualizing and analyzing data; and writing a data management plan.

Data Sources to Use Now

Social Explorer
Provides web-based access to United States Census data from 1790 to the present, and to other U.S. and international data, with the ability to make tables and interactive maps easily or export data for analysis. Data include the most commonly used variables and geographies.
Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.
PolicyMap
Access social, economic, health and demographic data about U.S. communities and markets in this online mapping tool. View data on map, in table or chart format, and download those data that are openly available. Reports provide a summary snapshot of an area: Community Profile, Community Health Profile, Rental Housing Report, and Housing Mortgage Report.
Access: Off Campus Access is available for: UNC-Chapel Hill students, faculty, and staff; UNC Hospitals employees; UNC-Chapel Hill affiliated AHEC users.

ICPSR
The Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) is a repository of academic and other research in the social and health sciences. UNC is a member institution which provides UNC affiliates with access to re-use deposited datasets and to deposit their own work. First-time users must create an account from the campus network. Includes:

- Child Care and Early Education Research Connections
- Civic Learning, Engagement & Action Data Sharing
- The Education Research Data Sharing Initiative
- Measures of Effective Teaching Longitudinal Database
- NCAA Student-Athlete Experiences Data Archive
- Open Data Flint, and
- Resource Center for Minority Data.

See the Thematic Data Collections link at the bottom of the page in the About section of the banner.
Data.census.gov
The Census Bureau's main data interface, replacing American Factfinder within the next year. Already, new data are only being loaded to data.census.gov.
IPUMS USA
U.S. Census and American Community Survey microdata from 1850 to the present. Includes ability to analyze data online; create samples; and link individual and household variables, e.g., children with certain characteristics of parents with other characteristics.

Education Data Sources

National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Data Explorer
Provides national and state results for all main subject areas assessed, including mathematics, reading, writing, and science. Includes online analysis capability. Results have been produced for the nation and participating states and other jurisdictions since 1990, and for selected urban districts (on a trial basis) since 2002.
NCES DataLab
Online table and regression maker tools featuring 30+ federal education datasets. Contains three powerful tools for your analytical needs: QuickStats – Allows novice users to create simple tables and charts; PowerStats – Allows researchers to create complex tables and logistic and linear regressions; and TrendStats – Allows researchers to create complex tables spanning multiple data collection years. Also, contains the Tables Library which houses 5000+ published analysis tables by topic, publication, and source.
NCES International Data Explorer
The International Data Explorer (IDE) is an interactive online tool with data from international assessments and surveys, such as PISA and TIMSS. Use the IDE to explore student and adult performance on assessments and survey results for thousands of variables for the U.S. and other countries.
Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS)
The IPEDS Data Tools present results from annual inter-related surveys of every college, university, and technical/vocational institution that participates in the federal student financial aid programs (Title IV-eligible institutions). For a thorough introduction, look for the Overview of IPEDS Data link under the Resources heading.

Data Sources to Use Later (Probably)

NCES Microdata

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) makes a great deal of data at the individual respondent level (microdata) available; however, researchers must apply for restricted access. Generally, such access is not available to students.

Census and Other Microdata through the Research Data Centers

The Federal Statistical Data Centers are a network of secure data enclaves across the country, usually hosted by a university. Applications to use Census data therein usually take several months to process. UNC is a supporting institution of the Triangle Research Data Center based at Duke University, which gives UNC applicants free access once their applications are accepted, a $15,000 benefit. Currently data holdings include Census, economic and health data but other Federal agencies are in negotiations to make their data available as well. Application requirements vary depending on the agency which provides the data, but Center staff are available to assist with applications.

Scraping Data

While many researchers are scraping web content to serve as their data these days, this is often a complex and very messy data source. Obtaining the data may take a good deal of time and may cost money. Consequently, this source may not work for the purposes of this class. Consider attending some of the Library Data Services workshops for coding (R Open Labs and Python)--see more on the Getting Help tab. If/When you get to the point of pursuing web scraping, ask your subject librarian for help obtaining permission.