Data Inventory (Data Dictionary)

Common Elements

Some categories of data—for example, race/ethnicity and gender—appear in two or more datasets. It is not unusual for data like these to have slightly different ranges of values in each dataset, often because of agency-by-agency differences in data definitions and reporting requirements.

For some of these data, NCLDS is developing Contributor-approved cross-sector common values. These common values do not replace the Contributor-specific values but instead supplement them, to make cross-sector analyses more straightforward when differences in agency-level definitions are not critical to those analyses.

When available, these values will be included in data requests or in aggregated data tables alongside (not in place of) the original values, will be distinguished with the inclusion of “NCLDS” in their names, and will include additional metadata (descriptive information about the data) that provides details about how the values were derived from the original data.

To propose a new Common Element, or an amendment to an existing Common Element: Download this form and email the completed version to NCLDShelp@nc.gov.