1. Illinois Goal Assessment Program

2. 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

3. Stata data dictionary
dictionary using “raw data file name”
_column() tells Stata where the variable begins
storage (memory management)
variable name
format and length
label

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

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

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

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

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

9. IGAP dictionary Write a dictionary to read the data set RC97
Get full record layout from computer lab
Download rc97.zip