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Abstract
In 1950 the Bureau of the Census changed its method of enumerating college students.
In the census of that year the students were counted as residents of the localities
in which they were attending college. This change makes comparisons between
1940 and 1950 census reports on population questionable, particuarly comparisons
between those reflecting such factors as migration estimates and extrapolation of
population changes for making current population estimates. In connection with the
work of the North Central Population Dynamics Technical Committee, NC-18, a
procedure for adjusting the 1940 population data to make it comparable with the
1950 data was considered necessary so that the estimates of migration into or out
of a geographic area would represent the true change. This paper presents the procedure
the author developed for estimating the number of students attending college
from the rural and urban areas of each county in a State, based upon the census
data, to be used in adjusting the 1940 data. Research work that is being initiated by
the Northeast Population Dynamics Technical Committee, NE-17, will include adjustments
of the 1940 census data through the use of this procedure. Helen R. White,
formerly of the Farm Population and Rural Life Branch, AMS, is to be credited
with ideas leading to the procedure. Many suggestions have been received from 'members
of the North Central Population Dynamics Technical Committee, especially
from Margaret Jarman Hagood and Paul J. Jehlik, Farm Population and Rural
Life Branch, AMS, and Henry S. Shryock, Jr., Division of Population and Housing,
U. S. Bureau of the Census. The paper is published with the approval of the Director
of the Nebraska Agricultural Experiment Station as Journal Series Paper No. 629.