OVERVIEW

This point datalayer shows the locations of colleges and universities in Massachusetts. Sites appearing in this layer are those normally attended by students after completion of high school. Categories are public and private, and include co-ed, vocational, technical, religious, medical. and traditional colleges and universities. This layer was developed by MassGIS and is based on all Massachusetts colleges listed in the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Web site as of October 13, 2004. A very small number of colleges could not be contacted and had no website, and therefore have been eliminated from this datalayer.

A few institutions have multiple campuses, as distinct from satellite locations. For example, Harvard School of Business and Harvard Medical School are campuses within Harvard University, and a point is included in this dataset for each. Some satellite campuses may not be included. For example, Northeastern University conducts classes in satellite locations such as Milford High School. Since Milford High School is a separate educational facility, it is not considered to be a Northeastern University campus, and a point is not included in this layer.

The layer is stored in ArcSDE and distributed as COLLEGES_PT.

For pre-kindergarten through high school educational facilities, see the Schools layer.

Points for schools listed on the NCES Web site were located using 1:5,000 color digital ortho imagery and Internet map sources (individual college web sites, Mapquest.com). In a few cases facilities were contacted by phone to verify their locations or address-matched in ESRI's ArcMap software.

The datalayer's point attribute table has the following items:

COLLEGE		Name of Institution (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
ADDRESS		Institution's mailing street address (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
CITYST		Institution's mailing city/town and state address (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
ZIPCODE		5-digit ZIP Code (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
PLUS_FOUR		Last 4 digits of ZIP Code, if available (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
MAIN_TEL		Institution's main area code and telephone number (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
URL		Institution's Uniform Resource Locator (website) (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
TYPE		Identifies Institution type (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/):  PRI - Private  PUB - Public
COLL_BD_ID		Unique 4-digit identifier used by www.collegeboard.com (Source: http://www.collegeboard.com)
NCES_ID		Unique 6-digit identifier used by www.nces.gov (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
UNDERGRAD		Undergraduate enrollment (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
GRAD		Graduate enrollment (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
ON_CAMPUS		Percent of all undergraduates living on campus as of Fall 2003 (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
DEGREES		Degrees or certificates awarded (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
DESCRIPTN		Description of institution contained in www.nces.gov (Source: http://nces.ed.gov/)
SITE		A numeric identifier assigned to each campus. Any value greater than '1' is considered a campus separate from the 'Main' campus.
CAMPUS		A description of the campus when there is more than one campus.
COMMENTS		General comments related to location, campuses, or other information (Source: MassGIS)
L_BASE		Location Base Map type code - represents both the type of base map and/or the technique used for digitizing the location. (Source: MassGIS). All coded "DOQ" - Digitized on screen using digital orthophoto base map.
L_ACC_EST		Location Accuracy Estimate - an integer value representing the estimated horizontal accuracy of the location in feet, according to the data developer. (Source: MassGIS). Values include 16, 100, and 500 ft.
L_TYPE		Location Type - a spatial reference code indicating what the point represents (Source: MassGIS). Codes include: AM   Address Matched Location CB Approximate center of a building footprint positively associated with the facility/site CB-ADMIN Approximate center of the administration building footprint positively associated with the facility/site CB2 Approximate center of a building footprint, NOT positively associated with the facility/site CF Approximate center of a facility CL Approximate center of property lot or parcel associated with a facility/site address CL-ADMIN Approximate center of property lot or parcel associated with the administrative office of a facility/site address CL-CAMPUS Approximate center of property lot or parcel associated with a facility/site address EL Estimated location FD Approximate location of front door or main entrance to a facility/site FD-ADMIN Approximate location of front door or main entrance of the administrative office of a facility/site
L_METH		Interpolation based on primary source material (L_SRC_1) (Source: MassGIS). Codes include: IN   Interpolation based on primary source material (L_SRC_1) IN-KNOW Interpolation based on MassGIS staff knowledge IN-VERB Interpolation based on verbal description of site IN-WEBSITE Interpolation based campus maps or other data contained in the institution's website
L_SRC_1		Code indicating the primary source material used to locate the feature (Source: MassGIS)
L_SRC_2		Code indicating the secondary source material used to locate the feature (Source: MassGIS)
L_SRC_3		Code indicating the tertiary source material used to locate the feature (Source: MassGIS). Currently blank.

MAINTENANCE

MassGIS maintains this datalayer.

In July 2007 points for the Lynn and Beverly campuses of North Shore Community College were added.

Last Updated 7/2/2007
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