Appendix D—Description of Variables

The variables that are included in this report are listed in table D-1. Those with variable names that begin with "M" and are followed by four digits are survey variables that come from items on the Library Media Center Questionnaire and those with variable names that begin with "S" and are followed by four digits are survey variables that come from items on the school questionnaires. For survey variables, the numeric part of the variable name can be found in the questionnaires to the left of the corresponding question. The variables without the letter plus four digit names are "created variables," meaning they were created using survey variables, frame variables (variables taken from the sampling frame), other created variables, or a combination of these. They are frequently used in the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) publications and have been added to the data files to facilitate data analysis. The definitions for the created variables follow table D-1. The variables without a variable name were created for this analysis and are not on the data files.

Average number of computer workstations: A variable created for this analysis by computing the average of variable M0075 across all library media centers.

Average number of computer workstations with internet access: A variable created for this analysis by computing the mean of variable M0076 across all library media centers.

Charter school identifier (CHARFLAG): A flag variable that identifies charter schools. 1 = School is a public charter school, 2 = School is a traditional public school. A charter school is a public school that, in accordance with an enabling state statute, has been granted a charter exempting it from selected state or local rules and regulation. CHARFLAG is based on S0230 from the public school and BIE school data files.

Percentage of all paid professional staff who are state-certified as classroom teachers: A variable created for this analysis by dividing M0064— the number of paid professional library media staff that are state-certified as classroom teachers— by the sum of M0053 and M0057— the total number of paid state-certified library media specialists and the total number of non-state-certified paid professional library media center staff.

Percentage of all paid professional staff with a Master's degree in a library-related major: A variable created for this analysis by dividing M0063— the number of paid professional library media staff that have earned a Master's degree in librarianship, library science, information science, educational media, instructional design, or instructional technology— by the sum of M0053 and M0057— the total number of paid state-certified library media specialists and the total number of non-state-certified paid professional library media center staff.

Percentage of library media center computer workstations with internet access: A variable created for this analysis by dividing M0076— number of library media center computer workstations with internet access— by M0075— number of library media center computer workstations available for student and/or staff use.

Percentage of students in school approved for the National School Lunch Program (NSLAPP_S): Taken from the public and BIE school data files, NSLAPP_S is a continuous variable created by dividing the number of students approved for free or reduced-price lunches (S0217) by the total number of K–12 grade students enrolled (S0047) among schools that participated in the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) (S0215=1). Schools that did not participate in the NSLP have valid skip values. For this report, NSLAPP_S is recoded as a categorical variable describing the proportion of students approved for free or reduced price lunches.

Student enrollment (SCHSIZE): Taken from the public and BIE school data files, SCHSIZE is a continuous variable based on the number of K–12 and ungraded students enrolled in a respondent's school (S0047). For this report, SCHSIZE was recoded into six categories.

Three-category school level (SCHLEVEL): Taken from the public and BIE school data files, SCHLEVEL is a three-category variable based on grades reported by the school: Elementary, secondary, and combined. Elementary schools are those with any of grades K–6 and none of grades 9–12. Secondary schools have any of grades 7–12 and none of grades K–6. Combined schools are those schools with grade levels in both elementary and secondary grade levels, or with all students in ungraded classrooms.

Urban-centric school locale code (URBANS12): Taken from the public and BIE school data files, URBANS12 is a created variable collapsed from the 12 category urban-centric school locale code (SCLOP_07) which was assigned using the 2000 Decennial Census data and recoded into four categories: city, suburban, town, and rural.

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