The School District Review Progrram

School District Review Program (SDRP)
Verification Guide
Revised January 2021

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U.S. Census Bureau

School District Review Program (SDRP) Verification Guide

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Verification Phase Overview................................................................................................... iii
Verification Phase Processing Procedures................................................................................ 1
1.1

Verifying School District Listings..................................................................................... 1

1.2

Verifying SDRP Updates in GUPS .................................................................................... 1

1.2.1 Starting a New Verification Project ............................................................................ 1
1.2.2 How to Conduct Verification Review ......................................................................... 8

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Start a New Verification Project ...................................................................................... 2
Table 2: Verifying Annotation Phase Changes ............................................................................... 8

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VERIFICATION PHASE OVERVIEW
During September 2020, the U.S. Census Bureau (Census Bureau) delivered the annotation
phase materials for the School District Review Program (SDRP) to mapping coordinators in the
fifty states and the District of Columbia. During the fall of 2020, the mapping coordinators
collaborated with school district officials for a review of the boundaries to submit any school
district updates to the Census Bureau through the SDRP. Upon receipt of school district
boundary updates, the mapping coordinators were responsible for reviewing, adjudicating,
annotating, and submitting digital files and/or submission logs to the Census Bureau for
insertion into the Census Bureau’s Master Address File/Topologically Integrated Geographic
Encoding and Referencing (MAF/TIGER) System.
Based on submissions from the mapping coordinator, the Census Bureau reviewed and updated
school district boundaries and attributes according to the established SDRP criteria and
guidelines. In some cases, the Census Bureau made minor changes to ensure that the school
district boundaries meet the criteria outlined in the SDRP guidelines.
The verification phase of the 2021 SDRP is the opportunity for mapping coordinators and school
district officials to review their school district boundaries as they now exist in MAF/TIGER. New
updates to school districts are not accepted during the verification phase. Verification phase
materials are provided to all mapping coordinators who submitted annotation updates by the
December 31, 2020 deadline. Any submissions received after the December 31, 2020 deadline
may not be included in the verification phase materials.
This document provides information for reviewing school district attributes and boundaries.
Verification phase procedures for the school district listings tables are in Section 1.1, while
school district boundary verification procedures are located in Section 1.2.
•

If the delineation of the school districts is found to be correct, the Census Bureau requests that
mapping coordinators communicate this by e-mail to geo.school@census.gov.

•

If school district updates (both spatial and attribute) need to be made during the verification
phase, please contact the SDRP team at geo.school@census.gov or
(301) 763-1099 before making any changes. This is to allow for an evaluation of the proposed
updates and to determine the best method for the mapping coordinator to submit those
updates.

•

No response by the deadline stated in the verification phase email notification is considered
acceptance that the Census Bureau made updates correctly.

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VERIFICATION PHASE PROCESSING PROCEDURES
1.1

Verifying School District Listings

The Census Bureau requests that mapping coordinators review relevant listings including the
following: Inventory and Grade Range (all states), County Coverage (all states), Coextensive
Coverage (limited states), and Relationship (limited states). Verification of the data contained
in these listings ensures that all school districts in a state are correct and spatial relationship(s)
with other geographic entities are correctly recorded and maintained. These files are available
in both text and Excel formats. The mapping coordinators need only to review each applicable
listing in one format.
Note: Due to the formatting of the text documents, please use Microsoft WordPad or any text program
like WordPad to open them. Otherwise, the margins and page orientation will have to be
changed to accommodate the text.
•

The Inventory and Grade Range (_SD_Inventory_V.txt and _SD_Inventory_V.xls) file is
a listing of all 2021 school districts recognized by the Census Bureau and includes the school
district name, Federal School District Local Education Agency (SDLEA) ID number, level, type,
and grade range.

•

The County Coverage (_County_Coverage_V.txt and _County_Coverage_V.xls) file is a
listing containing county-to-school district relationships. There is a separate record for each
unique school district/county combination.

•

The Coextensive Coverage (_Coextensive_Coverage_V.txt and
_Coextensive_Coverage_V.xls) file is a listing of school districts that are coextensive with
legal entities such as counties, county equivalents, or incorporated places. Please Note: Only
those states that received this listing in their annotation phase materials will receive one in their
verification phase materials.

•

The Relationship (_SD_GEO_Relationship_V.txt and _SD_GEO_Relationship_V.xls) file
is a listing of school districts that are commonly coextensive with one or more incorporated
place and/or county subdivision (town, township, borough, etc.). Please Note: Only those states
that received this listing in their annotation phase materials will receive one in their verification
phase materials.

1.2

Verifying SDRP Updates in GUPS

The tables in this section provide step-by-step instructions on how to verify the SDRP
annotation phase changes.

1.2.1

Starting a New Verification Project

To open the Geographic Update Partnership Software (GUPS) application and begin
verifying SDRP updates, follow the steps in Table 1. Before beginning, note that:
1. When changes have been saved, the project can be reopened in GUPS to the last saved state.
2. The computer must be connected to the internet and able to access the Census Bureau’s File
Transfer Protocol (FTP) site.

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School District Review Program (SDRP) Verification Guide

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Note: In all the Action/Result tables, the action is usually a command or action the participant needs to
perform and the Result(s) of the action will be shown in italics. For example: if the participant
clicks the GUPS icon on their desktop, the software should begin to run automatically.
Table 1: Start a New Verification Project
Step
Step 1

Action and Result

Select the Quantum Geographic Information System (QGIS) Desktop 3.4.4 from the All
Programs Start Menu list.

The QGIS splash screen appears. Note: QGIS is the open-source platform on which GUPS is
built.

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Step

Action and Result

Step 2

Click the Next or Previous buttons to review the QGIS System tips. To disable QGIS Tips on
start-up, click the I’ve had enough tips, don’t show this on start up any more! button.

Step 3

To begin a GUPS project, close the QGIS Tips! box by clicking the OK button. The box closes
and the Map Management dialog box opens, as shown below.

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Step

Action and Result

Step 4

In the Map Management dialog box, use the drop-down menu next to the Program field to
select program, ‘Boundary and Annexation Survey’, then Sub Program ‘School District Review
Verification by County’.

Step 5

In the State field, use the drop-down menu to select a state. The scroll bar to the right allows
moving up and down the list of states.

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Step

Action and Result

Step 6

In the Working County field, use the drop-down menu to select the county to verify. The
scroll bar to the right allows moving up and down the list of counties.

Step 7

After selecting the working county, GUPS asks to specify the location from which to load the
county’s shapefile. The Select Data Folder, Directory or Location box opens.

GUPS will only ask to specify a data download location once per project. When a project has
been closed and reopened, the shapefiles automatically load, even if no changes were made
during the first session.
Step 8

U.S. Census Bureau

In the Select Data Folder, Directory or Location box drop-down menu, select Census Web
from the dropdown menu.

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Step
Step 9

Action and Result

When Census Web is chosen, the shapefile for the county begins to load and progress is
displayed by a blue striped bar (color may vary), with the percentage of the upload completed
displayed to the right.

If a selected working county has no verification phase partnership shapefiles, GUPS will notify
that the chosen county has no data to verify.

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Step
Step 10

Action and Result

After the files load, GUPS returns to the Map Management box. A list of counties in the state
appears at the bottom of the Map Management box. Associated counties (counties that share
school districts with the chosen working county) are highlighted in yellow and are checked.

Only select associated counties needed to complete a project. Loading additional associated
counties may slow the performance of GUPS. GUPS allows a maximum of 10 associated
counties.
Step 11

In this example, all neighboring counties, Adams, Henderson, McDonough, and Schuyler
Counties are selected. Click the Open button at the bottom of the Map Management dialog
box.

Step 12

GUPS will automatically download the associated counties from Census Web. The progress is
displayed by the blue striped bar (color may vary), with the progress percentage noted to the
right.

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School District Review Program (SDRP) Verification Guide

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Step

Action and Result

Step 13

1.2.2

GUPS unzips and copies the files to the GUPS home directory, then loads them into the
application. The map management screen will show the project loading followed by a
progress bar with the message “Starting GUPS.” The data layers for Hancock County appear in
the Table of Contents and the maps for the selected adjacent (or other selected) counties
appear next to the working county in Map View.

How to Conduct Verification Review

Verification is the process of reviewing the school district boundaries to ensure that the Census
Bureau accurately and completely captured the changes submitted by the mapping
coordinator. The Geography Review Tool is used to guide the verification process by focusing
on the areas where the mapping coordinator submitted changes. To begin the review, follow
the steps in Table 2.
Table 2: Verifying Annotation Phase Changes

Step
Step 1

U.S. Census Bureau

Action and Result
Begin by selecting the Geography Review Tool button in the SDRP toolbar.

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Step

Action and Result

Step 2

The Geography Review Tool opens as a floating window on the screen.

Step 3

Select the Layer Name drop-down list and choose Annotation School District Changes.

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Step

Action and Result

Step 4

The Geography Review Tool will update with a list of annotation phase changes.

Step 5

To review changes, begin by locating the RELATE field in the table. The Relate field identifies
changes that have added area (IN) and lost area (OUT).

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Step

Action and Result

Step 6

Select the Relate field name to sort the table so that the IN changes are grouped together. The IN
changes were used by the Census Bureau to update the school district boundaries during the
Annotation Phase. The updated boundaries should be reviewed for accuracy and completeness.

Step 7

From the table, select a change record and then select the Zoom button.

GUPS will zoom to and highlight that record in the map view (highlighted in cyan). Review the
school district boundary (in orange in this example) to confirm that it appropriately reflects the
requested change.

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Step
Step 8

Action and Result
To view the change without the cyan highlight, go to the Menu Bar and select the Deselect
Features From All Layers button.

GUPS will deselect the highlighted feature from the map view and leave the change visible on the
map.

Step 9

To simplify reviewing change polygons, locate the Annotation School District Changes layer in the
Layers Panel.

Uncheck the change polygons labeled Losing Area by Annexation, Losing Area by Boundary
Correction, and Losing Area by Complex Dissolution. This will leave visible on the map the Adding
Area change polygons, reflecting the IN records in the Geography Review Tool.

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Step

Action and Result

Using the Geography Review Tool, review and confirm the remaining changes.
Step 10

If the delineation of the school districts is found to be correct, send an email to the Census Bureau
at geo.school@census.gov indicating that all changes have been accepted.
If school district updates need to be made during the verification phase, contact the SDRP team at
geo.school@census.gov or (301) 763-1099 before making any changes. This is to allow for an
evaluation of the proposed updates and how best to submit those updates.

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