Illinois Goal Assessment Program

Ugly Data Http://research.umbc.edu/~coates/ec611/612_sample.txt $, decimals, dashes, semicolons 709 variables, 3835 observations Try reading the data into excel How many variables? Open wordpad, paste and save as a txt file

Stata data dictionary Http://research.umbc.edu/~coates/ec611/612_sample.dct dictionary using “raw data file name” _column() tells Stata where the variable begins storage (memory management) variable name format and length label

Stata data dictionary Infile using “dictionary file name” infile using 612_sample.dct recall that dictionary calls the raw data set

IGAP Layout Columns variable description column numbers number of columns variable description

IGAP Layout variable format alphanumeric (strings) fortran (total columns, how many after decimal) comma (total columns, comma separates thousands) $ (dollar sign, comma separates thousands)

Dictionary again Handout - find school enrollment comma5, sixth column a ; example: 2,345; example: 286; Look at the dictionary What did I do to get the variable?

IGAP enrollment variable Senrollt, senrollo, denrollo, denrollt gen senroll=senrollt*1000 + senrollo What happens? Replace senrollt=0 if senrollt==. Drop senroll then try again Create denroll

IGAP dictionary Write a dictionary to read the data set RC97 Get full record layout from computer lab Download rc97.zip http://research.umbc.edu/~coates/ec611/rc97.zip