Dataset

The dataset contains characteristics of first year college students from 1970 through 2006. All students surveyed were full-time freshmen in 4-year colleges and universities as of fall of that school year. The data includes the students’ average grade in high school, their activities in the year preceding college, their political orientation, probable field of study, and several other unique statistics. One interesting characteristic is Attitudes—agree or strongly agree, that ranges from topics like their opinion on whether activities of married women are best confined to home and family, and on whether or not to legalize marijuana.

Format

The Statistical Abstract files are distributed by the US Census Department as Microsoft Excel files. These files have data mixed with notes and references, multiple tables per sheet, and, worst of all, the table headers are not easily matched to their rows and columns.

A few files had extraneous characters in the title. These were corrected to be consistent. A few files have a sheet of crufty gibberish in the first slot. The sheet order was shuffled but no data were changed.

The tables that were changed (this is table 278):

0166 0257 0362 0429 0445 0446 0459 0461 0462 0464 0465 0466 0467
0469 0479 0480 0481 0482 0483 0484 0485 0486 0487 0559 0628 0629
1144 1227 1231

This dataset consists of a table of 52 rows and 12 columns.

In percent, except as indicated (12.8 represents $12,800). As of fall for first-time full-time freshmen in 4-year colleges and universities. Based on sample survey and subject to sampling error; see source

Footnotes:
Includes other fields and undecided, not shown separately.