I just spent the last 3 hours trying to join the Asian, Black and Other tables with the county shapefile but had no success. I tried downloading the excel to DBF converter and various other methods but the values kept coming out as "null." After talking with about 5 other students who were working on this lab, no one was able to figure out how to get the values to actually come out rather than being "null." I know it's my mistake for not attending section and asking you questions, but hopefully you can give me some partial credit. I just found maps online regarding Asian, Black, and Other populations, as our maps should be identical to these. Thanks!
This is the sample map for Number of People that we had to create (Felt like I should include this to show that I did try...)
The map above details Asian population percentages in the United States. The map shows that there is a heavy Asian population in the West and East but not in the Central United States. This may be because there are many Asian immigrants who land on either the West and East coast and choose to settle there. Many Asians may tend to prefer on the coasts rather than inland.
The map above details the Black population in percentages across the United States. This map reveals that there is a heavy Black population in the South-East. The West does not have a heavy Black population but in California, there is. Unlike Asians in the United States, the Black population is also a lot greater for there is more density. This demographic cluster may be due to the US' past history with slavery.
The map above is that of Some Other Race population. This map shows that "other races" are heavily found in the West and are scattered everywhere in the United States. This makes sense for the United States is basically a salad bowl of numerous races and ethnicity's. People are bound to be scattered everywhere.
Overall, I learned a lot from GIS and was fascinated by its ability to create eye-pleasing and very complicating but useful maps. However, I really did not like the fact that one had to have instruction in using ArcGIS and had to be technically savvy. I just spent the last three hours trying to join the table to the shapefile and had no success. I ultimately felt like I was wasting my time trying to figure out something that possibly might not ever work. I wasn't sure if I was inputting my data incorrectly or formatting my excel sheet in the wrong way. Whatever the matter, the program itself became very frustrating. However, if one is technically savvy and becomes used to using ArcGIS, I believe the possibilities are endless. Overall, GIS is a very useful tool. Anyone can use it and pretty much everyone does. The only thing interesting is the limitations of GIS. I believe in the future with greater technological innovations, GIS can take map-making and analyzing to the next level and I am quite interested in how this field will develop.
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