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The NCES Education Demographic and Geographic Estimates (EDGE) program designs and develops information resources to help understand the social and spatial context of education in the United States. It uses data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to create custom indicators of social, economic, and housing conditions for school-age children and their parents. It also uses spatial data collected by NCES and the Census Bureau to create geographic locale indicators, school point locations, school district boundaries, and other types of data to support spatial analysis.
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School District Geographic Relationship Files

Most school districts in the United States are independent local governments that have authority to determine their geographic boundaries. These boundaries may or may not be consistent with boundaries for other types of legal and statistical areas like counties, Congressional Districts, or census tracts. As a result, school districts may have multiple spatial associations with other types of geographic areas – for example, a school district boundary may include territory in two different counties or intersect three different Congressional Districts. While EDGE’s Local Education Agency geocode file provides a limited set of geographic associations based on the location of each school district’s administrative office, this does not account for multiple school district spatial associations.

The School District Geographic Relationship Files (GRF) were designed to provide a comprehensive set of geographic associations between school districts and other types of geographic areas including counties, Core Based Statistical Areas (CBSA), Consolidated Statistical Areas (CSA), New England City and Town Areas (NECTA), Zip Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTA), Urban Areas, Congressional Districts (CD), places, census tracts, and census block groups. The GRFs are based on the Census Bureau’s TIGER/Line database, and the tables provide a separate record for each part of a district that is uniquely associated with one of the other geographic areas. The files are designed to help answer spatially-oriented questions like: How many Congressional Districts are represented in a school district? How many school districts in the United States serve more than one county? Which ZIP codes or Census tracts are included in a school district? And what portion of a school district is contained within a Metropolitan Area?

Geographic Relationship Files Documentation (354 KB)

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Data

Geographic Relationship Files (52.7 MB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2023.
  2. School districts in TIGER 2023 represent the 2022-2023 school year.
  3. Congressional districts in TIGER 2023 represent the 118th Congress. For additional information related to Congressional District data vintage, see discussion from the Census Bureau’s Redistricting Data Program.
  4. ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs) in TIGER 2023 represent the 2020 Census definitions.
  5. TIGER 2023 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of July 2023.
  6. New England City and Town Areas (NECTA) were discontinued under the 2020 standards for delineating Core Based Statistical Areas.
  7. County names and codes in Connecticut were replaced with county-equivalent entities that align with state planning regions.
  8. Urban Areas in TIGER 2023 represent the 2020 Census Definitions.

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (45.7 MB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2022.
  2. School districts in TIGER 2022 represent the 2021-2022 school year.
  3. Congressional districts in TIGER 2022 represent the 116th Congress. For additional information related to Congressional District data vintage, see discussion from the Census Bureau’s Redistricting Data Program.
  4. ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs) in TIGER 2022 represent the 2020 Census definitions.
  5. New England City and Town Areas (NECTA) were discontinued under the 2020 standards for delineating Core Based Statistical Areas.
  6. County names and codes in Connecticut were replaced with county-equivalent entities that align with state planning regions.
  7. Urban Areas and Core Based Statistical Areas were not included in the 2022 GRF collection because the Census Bureau’s delineation for these areas based on 2020 census data applied to 2020 geographic criteria were not available.

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (49.7 MB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2021.
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2021 represent the 2020-2021 school year.
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2021 represent the 116th Congress.
  4. TIGER 2021 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of March 2020.
  5. The Census Bureau updated most legal and statistical geographies as part of 2020 Census operations, but the 2020 urban area boundaries depend on final population counts for delineation. The urban area boundaries were not available at the time of EDGE’s 2021 GRF production.
  6. The ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs) in TIGER 2021 represent the 2020 Census definitions.

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (43.4 MB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2020.
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2020 represent the 2019-2020 school year.
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2020 represent the 116th Congress.
  4. TIGER 2020 uses the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of March 2020.
  5. The Census Bureau updated most legal and statistical geographies as part of 2020 Census operations, but the 2020 urban area boundaries depend on final population counts for delineation. Similarly, 2020 ZCTA boundaries are informed by ZIP Code areas maintained by the United States Postal Service and were not available at the time of EDGE’s 2020 GRF production. We anticipate these layers will be updated and included in future GRF collections.

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (48.8 MB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2019.
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2019 represent the 2018-2019 school year.
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2019 represent the 116th Congress.
  4. TIGER 2019 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of September 2018.

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (49.6 MB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2018
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2018 represent the 2017-2018 school year
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2018 represent the 116th Congress
  4. TIGER 2018 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of July 15, 2015

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (54.5 MB)

Documentation

School District Geographic Relationship Files Documentation, 2017 (621 KB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2017
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2017 represent the 2015-2016 school year
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2017 represent the 115th Congress
  4. TIGER 2017 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of July 15, 2015

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (54.7 MB)

Documentation

School District Geographic Relationship Files Documentation, 2016 (873 KB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2016
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2016 represent the 2015-2016 school year
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2016 represent the 115th Congress
  4. TIGER 2016 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of February 28, 2013

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (40.9 MB)

Documentation

School District Geographic Relationship Files Documentation, 2015 (456 KB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2015
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2015 represent the 2013-2014 school year
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2015 represent the 114th Congress
  4. TIGER 2015 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of February 28, 2013

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (10 MB)

Documentation

School District Geographic Relationship Files Documentation, 2014 (392 KB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2014
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2014 represent the 2013-2014 school year
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2014 represent the 114th Congress
  4. TIGER 2014 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of February 28, 2013

Data

Geographic Relationship Files (10 MB)

Documentation

School District Geographic Relationship Files Documentation, 2013 (381 KB)

User Notes

  1. Geographic codes come from TIGER 2013
  2. The school districts in TIGER 2013 represent the 2011-2012 school year
  3. The congressional districts in TIGER 2013 represent the 113th Congress
  4. TIGER 2013 uses the United States Office of Management and Budget (OMB) updates to metropolitan and micropolitan delineations as of February 28, 2013