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Census 2000 DVDs Software
from the 2002 FDLC
Andrea Sevetson, who used to be a documents librarian but who now works for the Census Bureau, gave a very informative and practical talk on the Census DVDs plus a demonstration. One of the most useful things I learned was when to use the DVDs and when to use American FactFinder: FactFinder only allows selection of 4000 tracts and 25 tables, so if you are doing any large-scale work (for instance, if you want to include all the tracts in Texas, there are more than 4000) you need to use the DVD. For smaller projects, FactFinder is probably preferable.
Using the DVDs, you can select elaborate geographies and save them for later use. You can customize areas by selecting a circle with its center on a particular point of latitude/longitude.
Andrea sent me her handout in electronic form (they ran out of paper copies) and I have it stored on our library server: library.stmarytx.edu/acadlib/doc/sa/fdlcs/census.ppt. The handout contains many links to Census Bureau tutorials and reference materials. She also sent some sample exercises; let me know if you'd like to see them and I'll forward her message. She is also interested in collecting any exercises that any of us come up with. Her email is Andrea.Sevetson@census.gov. I have detailed notes on her demo, too, if any of you need more information on this topic.
P.S. When I saw Andrea in the hall, I asked her about printed Census reports coming to depositories. She said her understanding is that any reports the Census Bureau prints (some are electronic only) will be sent to depositories in print.
