It's so hard to believe that my Cartography class is coming to an end, I have learned SO much this semester here at UWF. I never thought I would leave saying Adobe Illustrator is a Life Saver. For my final project, I was tasked to create a map of US national average cumulative SAT scores and participation percentages (seen below):
For this project, a
bivariate map using choropleth and graduated symbols was created. A
choropleth map was used to depict the average SAT scores because it excels at
emphasizing class-based data where phenomena are grouped together for a means
of comparison (Slocum, Thematic Cartography and Geovisualization, 2009).
The comparison of state cumulative average scores would best be seen by
the intended audience using a color ramp from red (lower scores) to green
(higher scores). The SAT score data was
classified into seven classes to best represent the variance in scores across
the nation and show more distinction than five classes. For this method,
equal interval classification was used, because it makes the thematic data
easier for the intended audience to understand (Slocum, Thematic Cartography
and Geovisualization, 2009). Since this
data pertains to average scores per state, the data was not standardized.
The second thematic
method used was graduated symbols to summarize the state participation
percentage. Graduated symbols were used because they best show the change
in quantity and the magnitude of participants taking the SAT. This data
was broken down into four manual classes ranging from two to one hundred
percent. This was done because it was
the easiest method that would be understandable by the public. Again,
this data was not standardized since the flat percentages were given for each
state. While other more advanced methods
of data classification such as natural breaks, quantile, or standard deviation
methods could have been chosen, due to the research specifications and public
audience, data simplicity was the primary goal.
To best capture the data in question, the map was created
in a portrait view to fit the entire continental United States. The
importance of this orientation was also that the state of Alaska and Hawaii
could be fully represented. It was also
decided that the map should be grouped and labeled together by relatively loose
regions, the southeastern/northeastern states, the Midwest states, the mountain
states, and the Pacific states (Alaska and Hawaii included but not to scale).
An inset map was also included to show the Washington D.C. area that
would be obstructed from a normal perspective.
To emphasize the regions, a drop shadow effect was used to draw the
viewer's eye to the various regions and make the map have a pop out
effect. In addition to utilizing drop
shadow, visual hierarchy rules were implemented. First, the choropleth and graduated symbols
were given the only color aside from the legend elements as these two
components were the most important. Second, the title was clearly visible
and concise, but all other text was reduced in size to not distract the viewer
from the map. Finally, any elements that
were not of visual importance such as cartographer information, data sources,
and north arrows were minimize either in size or opacity.
The results of this project were very interesting, the results show an inverse correlation between the two variables with less participation yielding higher test scores with the highest average scores in North Dakota with the lowest participation (2%) and the lowest scores in D.C. with the highest participation (100%). It just goes to show that using the SAT alone does not give you an accurate portrayal of statewide data with potential unrepresented groups.
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