Abstract

Moving from the Census to the American Community Survey
Track: GIS for Administration, Planning and Policy
Author(s): Richard Lycan

This paper will outline some of the opportunities and the pitfalls in using the American Community Survey (ACS) for school planning. The ACS is the Census Bureau program that will replace the 'long form' questionnaire in the 2000 Census of Population and Housing. The ACS surveys are done on a continuing basis rather than every ten years, presenting the opportunity to use more current data in school planning. In some respects the data will be better than from the Census, but the smaller sample size presents some problems, particularly for areas like census tracts. This paper will demonstrate the use of the ACS at the school district level as well as for smaller areas, such as school attendance areas. It will illustrate the problems resulting from sampling error and will suggest ways to address this problem.

Richard Lycan
Portland State University
Mail Code PRC
Portland State University
Portland , Oregon 97207-0751
United States
Phone: 503-725-5158
E-mail: lycand@pdx.edu