Data Analysis – Madison Crouse

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1N1t2RijMC2S7qqpOQx3YuVS5Ys1G-9p1lDbKVdQT2ks/edit?usp=sharing

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/157NXkjd_l4uZGehe-i4mzCvaNAGqaqcU3OwmaRtehMw/edit?usp=sharing

For this research project, I have chosen to look at data collected from the 2016 census in Virginia Beach and Farmville. There were multiple categories within the 2016 census including age, occupation, governments, housing, and income. The category that I picked for this project was education levels in both Farmville and Virginia Beach. Overall the census data showed that Virginia Beach had a higher percentage of those who graduated high school and/or higher.

In the Virginia Beach census that was collected, it said that 95.1% of individuals in that area graduated from high school or higher. That data that I focused on was those that were twenty-five years or older and their highest form of education. The data shows there are 39,670 individuals in Virginia Beach that are twenty-five years or older. Within that population, there are 1.50% who completed education less than the ninth grade, 3.40% who completed 9th to 12th grade without receiving a diploma, and 20.9% who completed high school. It also shows 27.6% with some college but no degree, 9.9% with an associate’s degree, 24.4% holds a bachelor’s degree and 12.2% who have a graduate or professional degree.

From these data collections, you can see that there is a high rate of those who have a degree from high school and college compared to those who did not complete high school. Virginia Beach is a big city with a very highly regarded educational system, along with many resources to help students stay “ahead of the curb”. There is also many community colleges and universities that are within and around the city. Being such a big city, there is more money that goes into the school system that helps students stay on the college path. Also, being a bigger city, we have many individuals that travel from all over to live and work in Virginia Beach because of all the job opportunities.

The other census collection data was taken from Farmville, Virginia. Farmville is a much smaller compared to Virginia Beach but resulted in a pretty close overall data. Farmville has about an 80.6% rate of individuals who graduated from high school or higher, which is close to Virginia Beach’s overall of 95.1%. The data shows that there are 9,515 individuals in Farmville who are twenty-five years or older. Out of these individuals, 8.80% dropped out before the 9th grade, 10.7% dropped out between 9th- 12th, and did not receive a degree. 30.4% received a high school degree, 18.6% some college but no degree, 5.9% received an associate’s degree, 13.4% received a bachelor’s degree, and 12.2% received a graduate or professional degree.

From this, we can see that Farmville has a much higher rate of individuals who dropped out of high school and did not receive a high school degree. The rate of those with a college degree is about the same. As we know, a good amount of the residents in Farmville are professors at either Longwood University or Hampton Sydney College, this can be from the high rate of individuals who have a graduate or professional degree.

https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/nav/jsf/pages/community_facts.xhtml